LIBRARY 

University   of   California 

IRVINE 


The 
Stage  Reminiscences 

of 
Mrs.  Gilbert 


STAGE    RKMlN'l 

OF 
MRS.   Gil, HI  R  I 


CHARLOTI  I-    M.   MAI 


ILLi 


NEW    YORK 
CHARLES    SCRIT. 

M  D  C  C  C  C  I 


MRS.  ANNE  HJRTLET  GILBERT 

From  a  photograph  by 

Sarony 

New  York 

In  the  collection  of  Mrs.  Gilbert 


THE 

STAGE   REMINISCENCES 

OF 

MRS.   GILBERT^ 

EDITED     BY 

CHARLOTTE   M.   MARTIN 


ILLUSTRATED 


NEW    YORK 

CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 

M  DCC  CC I 


2297 

6-5 


COPYRIGHT,    1901 
BY    CHARLES    SCRIBNER'S    SONS 


Introduction 

THOSE  who  have  been  so 
fortunate  as  to  know  Mrs. 
Anne  Hartley  Gilbert 
well,  must  have  been  placed  often  in 
the  position  so  familiar  to  the  editor 
of  these  pages,  of  listening  to  a  de- 
lightful flow  of  reminiscence,  anec- 
dote, and  "good  talk."  That  so 
much  of  interest  should  live  only  in 
the  memories  of  her  friends  has  been 
a  real  sorrow  to  many  of  them,  and 
they  have  often  urged  the  writing  of 
some  sort  of  autobiography.  "But 


Introduction 

why?"  she  would  answer.  "I've 
been  so  long  before  the  public,  that 
everybody  knows  all  about  me.  Be- 
sides, I  am  not  at  all  interesting,  just 
by  myself.  I  have  always  said  that 
actresses  and  actors,  who  are  good 
for  anything,  give  the  very  best  of 
themselves  to  their  audiences  when 
on  the  stage.  The  private  life 
doesn't  count."  Finally  came  the 
almost  tearful  surrender:  "I  have 
never  done  it  for  anybody,  but  I  will 
do  it  for  you.  I  will  tell  you  all  I 
can  remember,  if  you  will  put  it  into 
shape  for  me."  That  work  has  been 
a  labor  of  love,  the  only  regret  being 
that  no  pen  could  express  the  quick 
turns  of  the  head,  the  bright  eyes  and 


Introduction 

flushed  cheeks,  the  merry  little 
laugh,  that  have  emphasized  and 
punctuated  every  good  story  that  has 
come  up  during  our  hours  together. 
CHARLOTTE  M.  MARTIN. 


List  of  Illustrations 

Mrs.  Anne  Hartley  Gilbert .      .  Frontispiece 
Mr.  and  Mrs.    Gilbert  and  their  son 

George /p 

John  Ellsler J7 

J.  IV.  Wallack 41 

IV.  E.  Burton 45 

John  Brougham 49 

Mrs.  Gilbert jj 

as  the  Tuscarora  Schoolmarm  and  the  Dromajab 
in  "  Pocabontas  " 

J.  Wilkes  Booth jp 

Mrs.  John  Wood 77 

John  E.  Owens     .            73" 

Programme  of  Mrs.  Gilbert's  First  Ap- 
pearance at  a  New  York  Theatre     .  8 1 


List  of  Illustrations 

Warren 83 

James  Lewis 8$ 

Mrs.  Gilbert     ....  facing  page  91 

The  Worrell  Sisters 93 

in  "La  Belle  Helene  " 

Madame  Ponisi IOI 

at  Lady  Macbeth 

Mrs.  Gilbert IO(> 

William  Davidge        .      .      .      .      .      .    7/p 

The  Late  Augustin  Daly  and  his  Two 

Boys 123 

William  Florence 12? 

Miss  Clara  Morris 131 

Miss  Agnes  Ethel /JJ 

Mrs.  Gilbert 143 

Edwin  Booth 149 

"  Pique  "  at  the  Fifth  Avenue  Theatre  153 

Miss  Fanny  Davenport 7jp 

Miss  Fanny  Davenport 165 

Mrs.  Gilbert /7J 

James  Lewis  and  John  Drew  in 

"Pique" 183 


List  of  Illustrations 

"James  Lewis 189 

James  Lewis  and  Mrs.  Gilbert  in  the 

Comedy  of  the  "  Big  Bonanza  "  .  .  7pp 
Mrs.  Gilbert  and  James  Lewis  in 

"  7-20-8  " 207 

«  A  Night  Off" 213 

James  Lewis 227 

Mrs.  Gilbert 243 


Silhouette  of  Mrs.   Gilbert 
Bt  Mn.  H.  C.  Banner 


The 

Stage  Reminiscences 

of 
Mrs.  Gilbert 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

From  a  tintype  in  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Charlotte  At.  Martin 


I 

I  WAS  born  in  England,  in 
Rochdale,  Lancashire,  not  far 
from  Manchester.  But  I 
couldn't  help  that,  you  know.  All 
my  professional  career,  all  that  I  am, 
really,  every  inch  of  me,  is  American. 
Why,  even  my  English  nephew,  when 
he  came  to  call  on  me  in  London, 
used  to  stop  on  the  stairs  and  turn 
down  his  trousers.  He  knew  J 
wouldn't  stand  such  nonsense! 

I  have  a  copy  of  a  Rochdale  paper, 
printed  when  I  went  back  to  see  the 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
old  place  in  September,  1899,  telling 
me  things  about  my  family  that  I  had 
not  known,  myself,  before.  It  is  odd, 
though,  how  distinct  some  things  of 
those  early  days  are  in  my  mind.  I 
can  see  the  church— —chapel  they 
would  call  it,  for  my  people  were 
strict  Wesleyans — where  they  used  to 
take  me,  three  times  every  Sunday, 
into  the  big  old  pew.  There  I  sat 
with  my  grandfather  and  aunts, 
though  I  had  much  rather  have  been 
with  the  children  of  the  Sunday 
school.  They  were  very  good  to 
me,  my  aunts,  but  severe.  Once  in 
church,  they  asked  me  what  I  was 
thinking  of,  and  when  I  answered, 
quite  honestly:  "About  my  dinner," 
for  I  was  very  hungry,  they  were  im- 
mensely shocked.  And  when  we  got 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

home  from  church,  I  was  put  to  bed 
without  any  dinner,  to  teach  me  to 
think  of  more  serious  things.  I 
couldn't  have  been  much  over  five. 
I  am  afraid  it  only  taught  me  to 
make  more  clever  and  less  truthful 
answers. 

My  grandfather,  James  Hartley, 
was  a  well-to-do  man,  a  printer  and 
the  founder  of  a  house  still  doing 
business  in  Rochdale.  My  father, 
Samuel  Hartley,  was  his  second  son, 
and  grew  up  in  the  printing  business, 
married,  and  had  us  three  children. 
I  was  thinking  the  other  day,  it's 
funny  that,  with  all  the  people  who 
have  questioned  me  about  myself  and 
with  all  the  folks  who  have  inter- 
viewed me,  no  one  has  ever  asked 
me  about  my  mother's  family.  And 

3 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
I  owe  as  much  to  that  strain  in  my 
blood  as  to  anything,  for  on  that  side 
I  come  from  the  old  yeoman  stock 
of  England.  My  mother  was  a  Col- 
born,  and  her  people  were  farmers  up 
in  the  Melton  Mowbray  district. 
My  uncle  Robert,  1  remember, 
farmed  his  own  land  and  leased  land 
as  well,  owned  his  hunter  and  rode 
to  hounds  with  the  rest  in  that  fam- 
ous hunting  country.  They  were  a 
plain-living,  hard-riding,  open-air 
race,  and  their  descendants  still  have 
the  benefit  of  it  all. 

The  site  of  the  house  where  I  was 
born  is  now  covered  by  the  Town 
Hall  of  Rochdale;  it  was  then  known 
as  "The  Wood  Estate."  There 
were  differences  between  my  father 
and  his  father.  It  may  have  been  on 

4 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

religious  grounds.  I  was  too  little  to 
know.  Anyway,  my  father  went  up 
to  London  to  seek  his  fortune,  taking 
my  mother  and  brother,  and  leaving 
my  sister  and  me  with  our  grand- 
parents. My  sister,  who  was  a  little 
older  than  I,  was  sent  for  by  our  par- 
ents before  very  long,  but  it  was 
sometime  before  I  went  to  London. 
Once  1  thought  I  was  going,  but 
found  I  wasn't.  I  had  been  naughty 
—it  happened  sometimes,  for  I  was 
both  independent  and  stubborn — and 
my  youngest  aunt  said  she  would 
have  to  pack  me  off  to  my  mother. 
I  was  practical  and  serious-minded, 
and  believed  that  she  meant  it,  so  I 
went  off  and  began  to  gather  up  my 
belongings.  I  can  see  myself,  now, 
coming  down  with  my  arms  full  of 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

little  petticoats  and  night-gowns  ready 
to  pack,  and  it  always  seems  to  me  a 
pathetic  picture. 

Some  fifteen  years  ago,  when  Mr. 
Daly's  company  first  played  in  London, 
we  were  all  out  at  Sir  Henry  Irving's 
— he  was  plain  Henry  Irving  then— 
in  Hampstead,  and  Mr.  Toole  asked 
me  how  I  came  to  be  so  perfectly 
natural  and  easy  on  the  stage.  I  for- 
get what  I  answered,  but  in  the  course 
of  conversation  I  said,  some  moments 
later:  "You  know  I  was  trained  as  a 
dancer."  "That  explains  it,"  cried 
Mr.  Irving.  "Explains  what? "some- 
body asked.  "  Everything.  The 
ease  and  naturalness  and  all."  I  had 
never  thought  the  dancing  responsi- 
ble for  so  much,  but  I  do  attribute  to 
that  early  training  my  splendid  health 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

and  spirits,  and  my  long  life.  You 
know  the  famous  dancers,  Taglioni 
and  the  rest,  lived  to  be  eighty  and 
over.  I  was  taught  in  the  Ballet 
School  of  Her  Majesty's  in  the  Hay- 
market,  the  old  Her  Majesty's  Thea- 
tre that  was  pulled  down  only  a  few 
years  ago  to  make  room  for  Mr. 
Tree's  present  theatre,  and  the  new 
Carlton  Hotel.  We  were  taught  in 
return  for  such  services  as  we  could 
give,  "going  on"  in  the  crowd  from 
our  very  beginning.  There  was 
plenty  of  use  for  children  on  the 
stage  in  those  days  of  real  ballets.  I 
think  I  was  about  twelve  when  I  be- 
gan. There  was  some  opposition  at 
home,  but  my  mother  finally  con- 
sented, on  condition  that  I  neglected 
none  of  my  home  duties.  We  were 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
carefully   brought  up,  and   from  the 
first  each  had  some  household  work 
to  perform.      But  it  was  the  training 
at  the  theatre  that  I  loved. 

It  was  a  very  serious  profession, 
dancing.  Beginners  were  often  kept 
a  whole  year  "  at  the  bar "  alone. 
But  that  needs  explanation.  Our 
work-room  was  a  big  hall,  its  floor 
sloped  like  a  stage,  and  at  the  sides 
were  bars.  To  these  we  clung  with 
one  hand  while  we  practised  our  side 
steps.  Some  members  of  the  class 
were  always  at  work  in  this  way. 
Then,  from  time  to  time,  the  profes- 
sors and  great  teachers,  like  Paul 
Taglioni,  came  in,  and  we  children 

D  '  * 

would  go  into  the  centre  of  the  room 
and  do  our  steps,  sometimes  singly, 
sometimes  in  groups.  This  exercise 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

over,  there  was  no  sitting  down  to 
rest ;  we  were  expected  to  go  back  to 
our  practising.  This  practising  began 
with  our  waking ;  we  were  taught  to 
cling  to  our  bed-posts  the  first  thing 
after  getting  out  of  bed,  and  practice 
side  steps,  while  all  our  limbs  were  soft 
and  warm  with  sleep.  So  it  went 
on  all  day,  and  we  were  never  in  first- 
rate  condition,  and  ready  to  do  our 
best  as  dancers,  until  we  were  dead 
tired!  Every  motion,  every  step  had 
its  name.  It  was  like  a  drill,  done  to 
slow  music;  the  master  would  call  out 
certain  things,  and  we  did  them. 
Everything  was  so  exact  that  there 
was  no  chance  of  a  mistake.  Our 
costume  was  simple  —  long,  rather 
clinging  skirts  that  came  down  half- 
way between  knee  and  ankle,  and  a 

9 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
fluff  of  under-skirts.  The  outstand- 
ing gauze  skirt  of  the  modern 
premiere  was  unknown,  and  we  would 
not  have  stood,  for  a  moment,  the 
various  forms  of  undress  of  to-day. 
The  dancing  costume  of  my  day  was 
more  discreet  than  the  present  ball- 
dress.  Ours  was  a  regular  profession, 
don't  you  see,  and  we  knew  that  if  a 
costume  seemed  unsuitable  to  us 
and  we  refused  to  wear  it,  there  was 
no  one  else  to  be  found  who  would. 
I  remember  in  the  grand  ballet  of 
"The  Corsair,"  the  gauze  of  the 
Turkish  costume  offended  us,  and 
the  manager  had  to  substitute  silk. 

I  danced  as  child  and  young  wo- 
man at  Her  Majesty's  and  Drury 
Lane;  they  were  both  royal  theatres 
then,  and  the  pupils  of  the  Ballet 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

School  went  from  one  to  the  other  as 
they  were  needed.  People  took  their 
pleasures  seriously  then  in  London. 
The  opera  would  begin  at  eight,  and 
after  that  was  finished  came  the  grand 
ballet,  often  a  long  play  in  itself.  It 
was  done  wholly  in  pantomime,  and 
the  leading  dancers  had  to  be  masters 
of  that  art.  There  is  no  one  now  like 
that  except  Madame  Cavalazzi  at  the 
Empire  Music  Hall  in  London.  She 
has  the  old  power,  and  can  express 
anything  with  her  fingers,  face,  and 
toes. 

I  never  did  anything  to  make  my- 
self famous  in  London  in  the  dancing 
way,  but  just  worked  hard,  and  moved 
steadily  up  through  the  ranks  of  the 
ballet  to  the  "  second  four,"  and  the 
"  first  four,"  the  regular  stages  toward 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
being  a  first  or  solo  dancer.  But  I 
never  got  so  high  until  after  my  mar- 
riage to  Mr.  G.  H.  Gilbert,  when  I 
was  twenty-five.  Then  my  husband 
and  I  did  most  of  our  work,  and 
made  our  little  fortune,  in  the  pro- 
vinces. 

Mr.  Gilbert's  uncle  was  a  famous 
master  of  the  ballet  in  London,  and 
he  himself  was  both  a  capital  dancer 
and  a  good  manager  of  dancers  and 
dances.  We  toured  through  England 
and  Ireland.  It  was  what  we  used 
to  call  "  barn-storming ; "  we  call 
it  so  now,  but  the  thing  itself  is 
changed  a  good  deal.  Those  were 
the  days  of  a  real  pit  and  gallery  ;  the 
days  of  the  old  story  of  the  fight  in 
the  gallery  when  the  audience  begged 
the  victor  not  to  "waste"  his  con- 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

quered  opponent,  but  to  "  kill  a  fid- 
dler with  him."  They  were  rough, 
uproarious  days,  and  perhaps  there 
was  more  open  fighting  and  drinking 
than  was  good  to  see,  but  there  was 
real  wit,  too.  I  remember  once  in 
Dublin  we  were  just  going  to  open 
our  show — we  were  something  like 
the  famous  Ravel  Brothers,  only  our 
work  would  be  serious  comedy  while 
theirs  was  farce — and  we  went  in  to 
see  the  performance  of  "  Faust,"  as 
actors  always  will  go  to  the  play, 
when  not  working  themselves.  Some- 
thing went  wrong  with  the  trap  that 
should  have  let  Mepbistopbeles  down 
to  the  under-world.  He  went  half- 
way down,  and  then  stuck ;  they 
hitched  him  up  a  bit,  and  he  went 
down  better,  but  stuck  again.  They 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
tried  two  or  three  times,  and  then 
had  to  lower  the  curtain  with  him 
sticking  head  and  shoulders  above 
the  trap.  A  voice  in  the  gallery 
shouted  out :  "  Hurrah,  boys,  hell's 
full,"  and  the  house  roared. 

We  made  a  good  living  and  laid 
by  money,  and  finally  began  to  talk 
of  emigrating,  and  taking  up  a  farm, 
and  becoming  private  people.  It  was 
a  question  of  either  Australia  or 
America,  and  we  decided  finally  to 
come  to  America  in  1849.  I  have 
always  called  myself  a  "forty-niner." 
It's  strange,  but  only  two  years  ago, 
in  1899,  I  said  to  Mr.  Daly:  "I 
wonder  if  you  know  how  much  this 
year  means  to  me  ? "  He  didn't 
understand,  and  said  so.  "  Why,  in 
'49  I  came  to  this  country,  and  in  '69 
14 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

I  joined  your  company."  I  did  not 
dream  then  that  his  death  was  going 
to  make  '99  another  turning-point  in 
my  life. 

We  chose  America,  my  husband 
and  I,  because  of  some  friends  of  Mr. 
Gilbert  who  had  "  gone  out "  a  year 
or  so  before,  and  taken  up  land  well 
beyond  Milwaukee.  They  wrote 
glowing  accounts  of  their  settlement, 
and  we  took  our  tiny  fortune  and 
went  out  to  join  them.  Mr.  Gilbert 
liked  these  people,  believed  in 
them,  would  have  given  them 
his  last  penny.  Well,  in  the  end, 
they  got  it.  And  we  had  to  go  to 
work  again — but  that  comes  later  in 
my  story.  In  1849  the  world  had 
not  yet  got  over  the  shock  of  the  loss 
of  the  President,  the  steamer  that 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

went  down  in  '41,  carrying  with  it 
Mr.  Tyrone  Power,  the  comedian 
who  was  such  a  favorite  throughout 
America.  I  had  an  idea  that  steamers 
were  dangerous,  and  insisted  on  com- 
ing by  sailing  vessel.  We  did,  and  it 
took  us  five  weeks.  We  came  along- 
side Staten  Island  on  the  morning  of 
my  birthday,  October  2ist.  WTe 
struck  out  at  once  for  our  Western 
settlement,  making  the  last  of  the 
journey  in  a  regular  prairie-wagon. 
At  one  point  we  just  escaped  a  forest 
fire.  The  road  was  very  rough,  only 
a  few  planks  and  logs  laid  down  over 
the  marshy  places,  and  the  wagon 
bumped  and  thumped  as  the  horses 
were  whipped  up.  We  were  all 
frightened,  and  I  did  not  dare  say  a 
word.  It  was  only  after  we  were 

16 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

safe  that  they  told  me  that  if  we  had 
not  made  a  certain  turning,  we  should 
have  been  caught  by  the  fire. 

Of  course  our  new  home  was  very 
different  from  what  we  had  expected. 
I  cannot  even  tell  where  it  is  to-day, 
only  that  it  was  on  the  edge  of  the 
wilderness,  and  all  beyond  us  was  the 
then  almost  unknown  "  Indian  Ter- 
ritory." As  I  said,  we  sunk  our 
little  savings  there,  and  then  went  to 
work.  At  least  Mr.  Gilbert  did.  I 
was  not  able  to  work,  for  it  was  not 
long  before  our  boy  was  born.  We 
came  east  to  Milwaukee,  travelling 
for  the  first  twenty-five  miles  in  an 
open  ox-cart,  the  only  thing  we 
could  get.  After  that  we  got  a  wagon, 
and  reached  Milwaukee  all  right. 
There  we  had  two  little  rooms,  and 
17 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
made  a  home  for  ourselves.  I  always 
managed  to  have  a  home,  no  matter 
how  small  it  was.  There  the  boy 
was  born  in  1850,  and  as  soon  as  I 
was  able  I,  too,  went  to  work. 

Mrs.  John  Drew,  in  her  "  Remi- 
niscences," speaks  of  the  very  low 
salaries  that  she  and  her  mother  re- 
ceived when  they  first  came  to  this 
country — sixteen  dollars  a  week  for 
the  two.  Oddly  enough,  that  is 
exactly  what  Mr.  Gilbert  and  I  got 
for  our  services  when  we  began  in 
Milwaukee.  Of  course,  in  those 
days  living  was  much  cheaper  all  over 
the  country,  and  in  a  frontier  town, 
as  Milwaukee  was  then,  we  could  be 
very  comfortable  on  our  eight  dollars 
apiece.  Everything  was  most  simple. 
Our  rooms  were  up  an  outside  stair, 

18 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

and  at  the  head  of  the  stair  was  a 
sort  of  little  wash-up  place.  All  the 
houses  were  light  frame  affairs,  and 
although  we  were  fairly  near  to  the 
theatre,  and  so  in  the  centre  of  the 
town,  there  was  no  pretence  of  a  side- 
walk beyond  a  narrow  plank  walk, 
and  cows  and  pigs  were  to  be  met 
with  on  equal  terms.  We  got  into 
the  way  of  carrying  a  lantern  when 
we  went  back  and  forth  at  night,  for 
those  who  have  never  tried  can  have 
no  idea  how  huge  and  terrifying  a 
cow  can  seem  when  met  suddenly  in 
the  dark.  We  had  left  our  interest 
in  the  Western  settlement  in  the 
hands  of  our  friends.  We  heard 
afterward  that  the  property  became 
valuable,  but  we  never  got  a  penny 
from  it. 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
It  must  have  been  in  1851  that  we 
went  first  to  Chicago.  The  water- 
ways were  frozen,  and  we  packed  our 
household  things  on  an  open  cart,  and 
started  out  in  the  dead  of  winter. 
The  rest  of  our  company  went  by 
stage,  and  had  ears,  noses  and  fingers 
well  nipped.  We  fared  better  in  our 
open  cart,  although  it  meant  tearing 
up  our  blankets  and  winding  the 
strips  round  our  legs.  Chicago  was 
good  to  us,  and  I  love  the  big, 
noisy  place  now  for  the  sake  of 
the  little  town  of  long  ago.  John 
B.  Rice  was  the  manager  of  the  only 
theatre  in  Chicago,  and  he  used  to 
take  his  company  between  that  place 
and  Milwaukee,  traveling  generally 
by  water,  unless  it  happened  to  be 
midwinter. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

We  were  working  at  our  old  pro- 
fession all  this  time,  Mr.  Gilbert 
arranging  the  ballets,  training  the 
dancers,  and  dancing  himself,  while  I 
danced  in  the  big  ballets  and  "  be- 
tween the  acts."  An  evening's  enter- 
tainment was  different  then.  People 
got  their  money's  worth,  and  no  mis- 
take. The  programme  began  with 
the  serious  piece,  a  drama  or  tragedy, 
then  came  a  dance,  or  "  dance  with 
song,"  and  then  the  farce.  This  was 
the  usual  order,  but  it  was  varied 
somewhat  to  suit  the  various  stars. 
I  know  when  Collins  came — he  was 
Power's  successor  as  favorite  Irish 
comedian  in  America — there  were 
sometimes  three  farces  in  an  evening, 
and  I  have  acted  in  all  of  them,  and 
danced  in  between  !  For,  while  still 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
dancing  between  the  plays,  I  had 
begun  to  take  small  parts,  appearing 
first  as  the  fairy  in  "  The  Cricket  on 
the  Hearth."  I  was  less  frightened 
about  it,  because  I  knew  that  my 
dancing  alone  was  worth  the  money 
my  manager  paid  me,  and  if  I  failed 
in  the  other  thing  it  was  nobody's 
loss  but  my  own.  As  it  happened, 
no  one  lost  by  it,  and  later,  when 
Mr.  Gilbert  hurt  himself  by  falling 
through  a  trap  in  the  "Naiad  Queen," 
and  I  had  to  do  double  work  for  a 
time,  I  was  thankful  for  the  double 
resource  of  acting  and  dancing.  That 
was  only  for  a  time  though.  Mr. 
Gilbert  never  danced  again,  but  he 
took  to  being  prompter,  and  then 
stage-manager.  He  was  a  very  good 
manager,  too,  his  wide  experience  in 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

getting  up    ballets    standing   him   in 
good  stead. 

We  left  Chicago  and  went  to 
Cleveland,  then  to  Cincinnati  and 
Louisville,  and  back  to  Cincinnati 
again.  Most  of  my  experience  and 
all  of  my  training  was  got  in  those 
towns.  Players  used  to  go  from 
place  to  place  then,  engaging  them- 
selves often  for  the  season  only,  but  we 
travelled  less  than  most,  for  I  early 
took  to  doing  old  women's  parts,  and 
folks  didn't  seem  to  want  new  faces  in 
old  women  as  they  did  in  other  parts. 
Then  the  old  women  had  to  take  the 
heavy  parts  sometimes,  and  I  would 
take  anything.  Some  nights  I  would 
have  seventeen  lines,  and  other  nights 
as  many  "  lengths."  A  "  length,"  by 
the  way,  was  forty-two  lines.  The  old 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
term  has  died  out.  One  never  hears 
it  now.  I  don't  know  why;  I  don't 
know  its  origin  either.  It  was  good 
all-round  training  that  we  got  in  those 
days.  We  had  to  take  the  parts  given 
us  and  do  our  best  with  them.  I  be- 
lieve, you  know,  that  an  actor  who 
is  not  willing  to  try  everything,  and 
able  to  do  most  of  it,  is  not  worth  his 
salt.  Sometimes,  nowadays,  I  find 
young  people  who  want  to  be  stars 
all  at  once,  and  to  rush  on  to  the 
high  places  without  waiting  for  train- 
ing and  experience,  refusing  the 
small  parts  that  are  steps  by  the  way. 
So,  when  the  big  parts  do  come — and 
they  come  to  us  all,  sooner  or  later — 
they  are  overweighted  and  overbal- 
anced, and  fail.  Then  they  wonder 
why. 

26 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

It  was  in  Cincinnati  that  the  little 
home  we  always  managed  to  have 
took  the  shape  of  a  cosy  wooden 
house  not  far  from  the  theatre.  It  was 
a  pretty  place,  a  two-story  house  set 
back  from  the  road,  behind  white  pal- 
ings; white  with  green  blinds,  and  its 
narrow  front  yard  paved  with  bright 
red  bricks.  And  all  this  quite  in  the 
centre  of  the  town.  Mr.  Gilbert  was 
ill  at  this  time.  It  was  not  long  after 
his  accident,  and  he  spent  a  good 
many  of  his  days  at  the  place  of  a 
friend  outside  the  town,  trying  to  get 
well.  Our  house  got  speckled  and 
grimy  with  rain  as  time  went  on,  al- 
though it  had  been  painted  so  re- 
cently that  the  landlord,  who  lived 
next  door,  would  not  do  anything  to 
it,  and  only  laughed  at  me  when  I 
27 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
fretted  over  it.  I  loved  everything 
to  be  spotlessly  clean,  and  got  into 
the  way  of  standing  across  the  road 
with  my  boy,  and  studying  the  house 
as  it  grew  more  and  more  shabby. 
Finally  I  said :  "  I  believe  we  two 
could  wash  it."  That  was  one  even- 
ing, and  the  next  morning  we  were 
up  long  before  light  and  at  work  with 
warm  water,  soap  and  brushes.  We 
tried  the  big  ladder  at  first,  but  that 
fell  down,  and  once  down  it  was  too 
much  for  us.  So  what  George  could 
not  do  with  the  short  ladder,  I  man- 
aged to  do  by  reaching  out  of  the  bed- 
room windows.  Then  we  rinsed  it  off 
by  dashing  pails  of  water  up  against 
it.  It  was  all  over  before  the  milk- 
man made  his  morning  rounds. 
Everybody  thought  1  was  crazy,  and 
28 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

when  Mr.  Gilbert  came  home — this 
was  done  while  he  was  away,  of 
course — he  never  said  a  word  about 
the  house,  but  wanted  to  know  why 
we  had  not  washed  the  fence  !  But, 
oh,  dear,  I  have  not  thought  of  all 
this  for  years. 

In  towns  like  Cincinnati,  Chicago 
and  Louisville,  they  used  to  keep 
stock  companies  in  the  theatres  while 
the  stars  traveled  from  place  to  place, 
sometimes  alone,  sometimes  with 
their  leading  lady  only ;  and  some- 
times, as  in  the  case  of  great  men  like 
Edwin  Forrest,  with  their  "  second 
man,"  who  took  all  the  business  ar- 
rangements off  their  shoulders,  and 
played  next  best  parts.  Most  stars 
came  for  a  week,  some  for  two,  and 
some  for  only  a  few  days.  The 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
money  arrangements  I  don't  know 
much  about ;  the  star  usually  took  a 
percentage  of  the  profits,  I  believe. 
But  Friday  night  was  always  the 
star's  benefit,  when  he  did  his  strong- 
est piece  and  took  as  his  share  one- 
half  of  the  gross  receipts.  They  all 
played  "  in  repertory,"  in  regulation 
pieces  ranging  from  Shakespeare  to 
the  popular  farces  of  the  day ;  and 
we  knew,  when  a  certain  man  was 
coming,  pretty  much  what  his  plays 
would  be.  Still,  except  for  the  first 
night  of  his  engagement,  we  knew 
exactly  what  was  coming  only  from 
day  to  day.  I  was  what  is  known  as 
"  a  quick  study  ; "  one  had  to  be  in 
those  days.  It  was  not  as  bad  as  it 
sounds,  though,  for  the  same  stars 
came  year  after  year,  and  we  got  to 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

know  their  plays.  Although  each  of 
us  seldom  had  the  same  part  for  two 
years  in  succession,  we  had  seen  them 
all  done.  It  was  very  rare  to  have 
an  entirely  unfamiliar  play  "sprung" 
on  us,  but  that  did  happen  to  me 
once,  and  its  story  comes  later.  The 
fact  that  I  always  had  my  eyes  open 
made  things  easier  for  me.  I  got  in- 
to the  way  of  watching  every  part 
going  on  around  me.  To  this  day  I 
find  myself  still  watching,  and  I  often 
say  to  myself:  "  I  wonder  if  I  should 
do  that  in  just  that  way,  if  I  were 
acting  that  part  ?  " 

We  would  get  our  Monday  part 
on  the  Saturday,  and  that  gave  us  all 
day  Sunday  for  study ;  but  for  the 
rest  of  the  week  we  would  get  the 
Tuesday  part  on  the  Monday,  have 

3' 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
perhaps  a  bit  of  Monday  afternoon, 
and  Monday  night  after  the  perform- 
ance, for  study,  have  a  rehearsal  on 
Tuesday  morning,  play  the  part  on 
Tuesday  night,  and  then  begin  work 
on  another  part  for  Wednesday  night. 
A  different  play  every  night  was  the 
rule.  "  Runs  "  were  unknown  ;  an 
entire  week  of  one  play  was  an  un- 
usual success,  and  possible  only  in 
big  centres.  Sometimes,  when  we 
were  not  quite  sure  of  ourselves,  we 
would  take  our  lines  along  and  study 
them  between  the  acts,  or  during  our 
waits.  Our  call  would  come,  and  we 
would  tuck  the  parts  just  anywhere, 
usually  under  the  slender  wood-work 
of  the  wings  ;  we  called  it  "  winging 
the  parts."  Then,  if  the  scene  were 
shifted,  the  parts  would  be  whisked 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

out  of  sight   and    reach,  and    there 
would  be  a  great  flutter  and  outcry. 

We  had  to  supply  our  own  cos- 
tumes, and  we  often  made  the  greater 
part  of  them.  For  a  long  time  I 
made  mine  altogether.  You  can 
fancy  how  much  time  we  had  for  sew- 
ing, with  all  the  other  work.  I  re- 
member Mr.  Gilbert  saying  so  often  : 
"  Do  you  intend  to  get  to  bed  to- 
night at  all  ?  "  Whenever  I  bought 
a  dress,  it  was  with  an  eye  to  some 
particular  part ;  but  beyond  that  part 
lay  many  another  to  which  the  gown 
could  be  adapted.  We  were  always 
on  the  lookout  for  things,  bits  of 
chintz,  laces,  and  what  not.  Our 
only  guide  was  the  list  of  costumes 
printed  in  the  front  of  the  little  books 
of  the  play.  I  always  liked  to  follow 

33 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
these  lists.  I  know  Mr.  Gilbert  used 
to  laugh  at  me  and  say  that,  if  the 
directions  said  I  was  to  black  the 
soles  of  my  boots  for  a  certain  part, 
I  would  do  it.  And  so  I  would ! 
Perhaps  I  would  not  go  quite  as  far 
as  that,  but  you  may  depend  upon  it 
that  if  a  thing  is  printed  in  the  direc- 
tions it  has  some  reason  for  being 
there,  and  may  mean  something  to 
the  author  or  audience  that  we  on 
the  stage  cannot  see.  I  have  always 
found  it  safer  to  follow  directions 
exactly. 

In  the  matter  of  "make-up,"  we 
used  only  powder  and  rouge  in  those 
days,  and  very  little  of  them,  only 
just  enough  to  prevent  our  faces  tak- 
ing a  ghastly  pallor  from  the  unnat- 
ural glare  of  the  footlights.  To  this 

34 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

day,  much  painting  of  the  face  dis- 
tresses me ;  and  the  excessive  black- 
ening of  the  eyes,  and  the  little  red 
spot  in  the  corners,  affect  me  most 
unpleasantly.  It  looks  as  if  the  actor 
had  hurt  himself  badly.  They  tell 
me  I  never  look  quite  the  same  in 
any  two  parts,  but  except  for  this  care 
about  detail  in  costume,  which  has 
clung  to  me  always,  I  do  very  little 
to  make  myself  different.  Painted 
age  and  painted  wrinkles  never  look 
natural,  and  I  avoided  them  as  much 
as  possible,  even  when  I  needed  them. 
I  really  don't  know  just  what  I  do ; 
I  suppose  the  constant  thinking  my- 
self into  a  part  ends  in  giving  me  an 
expression  that  belongs  only  to  the 
character  I  am  just  then  personating. 
I  used  to  have,  at  home,  a  big  trunk 

35 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
that  I  called  my  theatre-trunk,  and 
the  things  I  needed  for  each  night 
were  sent  down  to  the  theatre,  that 
same  day,  in  a  sort  of  champagne 
basket.  Of  course  we  had  to  be  in- 
genious, and  make  things  do  ;  I  can 
even  remember  playing  a  character 
in  one  costume  through  every  act, 
and  for  the  best  of  reasons. 

The  better  part  of  our  Western 
experience  was  under  the  manage- 
ment of  either  Lewis  Baker  or  John 
Ellsler.  Ellsler  had  been  an  actor 
himself  in  the  East,  and  knew  many 
of  the  famous  actors  of  that  day  ;  so, 
when  he  came  to  be  a  manager  in 
Cleveland  and  Cincinnati,  most  of 
the  stars  who  came  to  him  were  his 
personal  friends.  William  E.  Bur- 
ton was,  I  know.  Mrs.  Farren  and 
36 


John   Elhler 

From  a  photograph   by  J.  F.  Ryder,  Cleveland, 
0.     In  the  collection  of  E-vert  jfansen  Wendell^  Esq. 


37 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

Wallack — J.  W.  Wallack,  a  cousin 
of  Lester,  and  a  capital  actor  himself 
— had  been  playing  for  a  week  at 
Mr.  Ellsler's  theatre,  when  Burton 
came,  and  it  was  thought  best  to  keep 
them  on  to  play  in  his  support,  dur- 
ing the  three  days  of  his  stay.  I  had 
never  seen  Burton  before,  nor  did  I 
ever  see  him  after,  but  in  those  three 
days  he  played  Aminadab  Sleek  in 
"  The  Serious  Family  ;  "  Toodles, 
Jem  Baggs — the  "  Wandering  Min- 
strel," who  won't  move  on  under  a 
shilling — and  Tony  Lumpkin,  the  most 
wonderful  Lumpkin  I  ever  saw.  He 
was  always  excruciatingly  funny,  but 
there  was  no  buffoonery  about  it. 
There  was  one  place,  I  remember, 
where  three  of  us  had  to  stand  facing 
him,  our  backs  to  the  audience,  and 

39 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
we  were  thankful,  for  it  was  impossi- 
ble to  keep  our  faces  straight.  I 
have  always  made  a  point  of  keeping 
my  countenance,  for  a  stageful  of  gig- 
gling people  upsets  an  audience.  But 
when  I  was  doing  Lady  Creamly  to 
Mr.  Burton's  Sleek  I  had  to  bite  my 
lips  until  they  bled.  Besides  Lady 
Creamly  and  Mrs.  Toadies,  I  played 
Mrs.  Hardcastle  in  Burton's  support. 
Oh,  that  Mrs.  Hardcastle!  I  had 
done  the  others  before,  but  she  was 
new. 

On  the  Saturday  before  the  play 
was  given,  I  went  into  the  green- 
room to  see  the  cast  for  Monday, 
and  to  find  out  what  my  part  was. 
Mrs.  Farren  was  sitting  near.  I  read 
the  heading,  "  She  Stoops  to  Con- 
quer ; "  I  ran  my  eye  down  the  cast 
4o 


J.  W.  Wallack 

From  a  photograph  by  C.  D.  Fredricks  & 
Co.  In  the  collection  of  Evert  Jansen  Wendell, 
Etq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

and  found  I  was  to  be  Mrs.  Hard- 
castle,  an  entire  stranger  to  me. 
"  Is  she  long  ? "  I  asked  Mrs.  Far- 
ren.  "  Long  ?  "  she  answered,  "  she 
is  all  through  it,  and  you  will  have 
your  hands  full."  They  said  my 
face  fell  a  yard.  I  did  not  know 
a  line  of  the  part,  had  never  seen  it 
acted,  and  had  no  idea  how  to  dress 
it.  That  was  Saturday.  Sunday 
morning  I  woke  up  with  a  blind, 
bilious  headache.  By  noon  I  was 
able  to  take  a  cup  of  tea  and  begin 
to  study.  All  the  afternoon,  I  spent 
out  in  the  garden  learning  my  lines, 
and  later  my  husband  found  me 
walking  up  and  down  our  room  in 
the  dark.  "  What  are  you  doing  ?  " 
he  asked  me.  "  Studying  my  part," 
I  answered,  and  so  I  was. 

43 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
Fortunately,  Mrs.  Mann,  who  had 
been  doing  old  women's  parts  in  Mr. 
Ellsler's  theatre,  a  year  or  two  before, 
had  just  returned  from  a  tour  in  the 
South  with  her  daughter,  Alice  Pla- 
cide,  and  was  boarding  opposite  us. 
She  was  just  the  one,  I  thought,  to 
tell  me  about  Mrs.  Hardcastle  s  cos- 
tume, so  I  ran  across  to  ask.  She 
gave  me  the  pattern  for  the  necessary 
cap,  and  I  turned  out  an  old  chintz 
gown  from  my  theatre-trunk.  So, 
by  rehearsal  on  the  Monday  morn- 
ing, I  was  fairly  ready.  I  asked  Mr. 
Burton  about  the  business  of  the 
part.  I  used  to  make  a  point  of 
asking  the  stars  about  the,  business 
that  played  up  to  them.  It  was 
really  the  most  important  part  of  it 
all  to  them.  They  did  not  so  much 

44 


W.  E.  Burton 

From  a  f  holograph  by  Rockwood,  New  York.      In 
the  collection  of  E-vert  Jansen  Wendell,  Esq. 


45 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

mind  how  the  supports  did  their 
parts  as  parts.  What  they  wanted 
was  to  get  their  own  cues  properly 
given,  and  to  find  people  on  their 
left  when  they  wanted  them  there, 
and  not  wandering  about  on  their 
right  or  at  the  back  of  the  stage. 

Mr.  Burton  was  charming  and 
helpful,  and  kind,  very  kind  to  me. 
He  taught  me  a  few  little  things  to 
do  as  Mrs.  Hardcastle,  and  also  told 
me  the  exit  that  Mrs.  Hughes  always 
used  in  the  "  swamp  scene."  She 
was  the  leading  old  woman  in  his 
New  York  theatre,  and  a  clever  ac- 
tress. It  was  not  much  in  particular, 
that  exit,  just  a  trick  of  picking  up 
her  skirts  and  running  off,  but  I  was 
glad  to  use  it,  and  it  pleased  the  au- 
dience. At  rehearsal,  Mr.  Burton 

47 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
said  :  "  Be  sure  and  don't  forget  the 
line  you  are  to  say  as  you  are  going 
off  the  stage."  1  was  to  call  "  Con- 
stance," and  so  give  the  man  on  the 
scene  a  chance  to  say  something 
about  constancy.  "  Oh,  dear,"  I  said, 
"  why  did  you  tell  me  ?  I  shall  be 
sure  to  forget  it."  And  I  did.  Or, 
rather,  I  put  it  off  so  late,  that  when 
I  finally  yelled  "  Constance,"  it  broke 
them  all  up,  and  the  man  with  the 
"  gag  "  about  constancy  could  not  be 
heard.  Mr.  Burton  wanted  me  to 
go  to  New  York  with  him  and  play 
second  to  Mrs.  Hughes.  It  was  a 
great  compliment,  but  some  years 
were  to  pass  before  I  got  to  New 
York. 

My    first    real    hit    was    in    John 
Brougham's  "  Pocahontas."    I  played 
48 


"John   Brougham 

From  a  photograph  by  C.  D.  Frcdricks  &  Co., 
taken  in  1861.  In  the  collection  of  Evert  jfansen 
Wendell,  Esj. 


49 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

in  it  with  him  often  in  the  West,  but 
only  once  in  New  York,  when  Mr. 
Daly  gave  a  benefit  to  him  on  May 
13,  1876,  at  the  second  Fifth  Ave- 
nue Theatre.  On  that  particular 
afternoon  we  did  "  The  Serious  Fam- 
ily," with  Maurice  Barrymore, 
Georgie  and  John  Drew  in  the  cast, 
and  "  Pocahontas,"  with  John  Broug- 
ham in  his  old  part  of  Powhatan. 
Was  he  as  delightful  as  he  seemed  ? 
Yes,  indeed,  and  ever  so  much  more 
so.  The  embodiment  of  wit  and 
fun,  of  endless  resource  and  good- 
humor.  Everybody  knows  the  story 
of  the  night  in  New  York,  while  the 
burlesque  was  still  new,  when  his 
Pocahontas^  Henrietta  Hodson,  failed 
to  appear,  and  he  carried  on  the  play, 
giving  her  lines  in  his  own  character 

5' 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

of  Powhafan,  with  a  prefatory  "  as 
my  daughter  Poky  would  say  ; "  and 
so  getting  through  the  performance 
until  it  became  absolutely  necessary 
to  bestow  something  upon  John 
Rolfe,  for  his  bride,  when  he  seized  a 
broom  from  the  wings  and  placed  it 
in  the  bridegroom's  arms  with  a 
<l  take  her,  my  dear  fellow." 

In  those  old  Western  days  we  had 
a  Pocahontas,  to  be  sure,  but  we  were 
short  of  other  people,  so  I  took  the 
Wee-cha-ven-da,)  the  Tuscarora  School- 
marm,  and  the  Dromaj 'ah;  they  were 
short  parts,  and  were  easily  arranged 
so  that  one  person  could  handle 
them.  The  little  dance  of  the  Drom- 
ajah,  which  became  quite  a  feature  of 
the  role^  was  pure  chance  in  the  be- 
ginning, as  those  things  often  are.  I 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

had  given  a  little  skip  of  high  spirits 
on  my  exit  from  that  scene,  and  peo- 
ple were  amused  by  it,  so  that  I  had 
to  repeat  it.  Finally,  my  husband 
worked  up  quite  a  dance  for  me,  and 
it  always  got  applause.  Years  after, 
when  I  was  in  Mrs.  John  Wood's 
company  in  New  York,  we  went  over 
to  Brooklyn  to  do  "  Pocahontas  "  for 
some  special  occasion.  They  were 
all  surprised  at  my  making  s'o  much 
of  these  small  parts.  The  whole 
thing  was  a  success  in  Brooklyn  ; 
the  critics  said  that  it  was  the  best 
rendering  of  the  play  since  Brougham 
had  done  it,  and  Mrs.  John  Wood 
thought  it  worth  her  while  to  put  it 
on  at  her  New  York  house,  where  it 
had  a  run,  she  doing  Pocahontas  to 
the  Powhatan  of  William  Davidge. 

55 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
When  I  was  young,  making  a  hit 
did  not  mean  what  it  seems  to  mean 
now.  There  was  no  devoting  your- 
self to  one  part,  or  even  one  line  of 
parts,  just  because  you  happened  to 
be  good  in  it  and  the  audience  liked 
it.  A  hit  meant  only  that  you  had 
put  a  certain  added  value  to  your 
name,  and  that  managers  of  stock 
companies  would  watch  you  and  re- 
member you.  So,  although  I  made 
a  success  in  a  burlesque  part,  I  went 
on  doing  old  women,  and  even  heavy 
parts.  Why,  it  was  in  the  year  of  the 
Tuscarora  Schoolmarm  that  I  did  Lady 
Macbeth  in  Edwin  Booth's  support. 
That  was  in  Louisville,  Ky.  I  had 
seen  Booth  first  as  a  star  in  Chicago, 
on  his  return  from  California,  where 
he  had  been  playing  with  his  father. 
56 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

He  was  always  a  great  actor,  and  a 
grand  man.  Ah,  but  things  were  so 
simple  then  !  I  can  remember  his 
doing  Macbeth  in  a  cheap  "  prop- 
erty "  crown,  and  very  queer  robes. 
But  he  was  a  good  Macbeth,  a  charm- 
ing Romeo,  strong  in  every  part  he 
undertook. 

But  the  most  perfect  Romeo,  the 
finest  I  ever  saw,  was  the  brother, 
Wilkes  Booth.  He  was  very  hand- 
some, most  lovable  and  lovely.  He 
was  eccentric  in  some  ways,  and  he 
had  the  family  failings,  but  he  also 
had  a  simple,  direct,  and  charming 
nature.  The  love  and  sympathy  be- 
tween him  and  his  mother  were  very 
close,  very  strong.  No  matter  how 
far  apart  they  were,  she  seemed  to 
know,  in  some  mysterious  way,  when 

57 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
anything  was  wrong  with  him.  If 
he  were  ill,  or  unfit  to  play,  he  would 
often  receive  a  letter  of  sympathy, 
counsel,  and  warning,  written  when 
she  could  not  possibly  have  received 
any  news  of  him.  He  has  told  me  of 
this,  himself.  No,  I  never  felt  that 
it  was  madness  that  carried  him  into 
the  plot  to  assassinate  the  President.  I 
know  from  my  own  limited  experi- 
ence how  high  feeling  could  run  in 
those  days.  A  man  lived  so  wholly 
with  people  who  thought  as  he  did 
that  any  one  on  the  other  side  was 
hateful  to  him.  Whatever  drew 
Wilkes  Booth  into  the  plot,  it  was 
not  quite  dare-deviltry.  And  if  the 
lot  fell  to  him  to  do  the  thing,  I  feel 
sure  that  he  went  through  with  it 
without  a  backward  thought.  He  had 
s* 


J.    l^ilkes  Booth 

From  a  photograph  by  C.  D.  Fredrick*  &  Co., 
Nrw  York.  In  the  collection  of  Evert  jfansen 
ffenJell,  Etq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

that  kind  of  loyalty,  that  kind  of 
courage.  Perhaps  the  devotion  of  a 
high-strung  Nihilist,  who  believes  in 
his  cause,  comes  nearest  to  expressing 
it.  I  ought  to  say  that  this  is  just 
my  fancy  from  having  known  the  man. 
My  playing  Lady  Macbeth  was  not 
so  strange  as  it  sounds.  Heavy  parts, 
as  I  have  said,  were  often  given  to  the 
"  old  women,"  and  managers  could 
not  be  blamed  for  getting  double 
work  for  "  single  money."  And  in 
those  days  out  there,  there  was  no 
talk  of  "  that's  not  my  work,"  or 
"  that  is  not  in  my  line."  When 
Edwin  Booth  came  to  Louisville,  our 
leading  lady  was  a  little  woman.  She 
knew  she  could  not  fill  the  part,  and 
very  sensibly  did  not  try.  So  it  fell 
to  me.  It  was  not  such  a  great  un- 

61 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

dertaking,  for,  in  my  years  of  training 
I  had  filled  many  of  the  characters  in 
the  play,  and  had  lived  the  rest,  for 
my  eyes  and  ears  seemed  to  take  in 
everything.  Beginners  in  Macbeth 
were  sent  on  as  attendant  witches,  and 
there  I  made  my  start.  Then  I  had 
been  the  boy  Donalbain,  and  a  guest 
at  the  banquet,  and  the  gentlewoman 
who  attends  the  queen.  I  had  even 
done  all  the  apparitions,  one  after  the 
other.  And  that's  no  laughing  mat- 
ter !  To  be  several  ghosts  in  rapid 
succession,  and  give  an  individual  ex- 
pression and  voice  to  each,  takes 
thought  and  study,  I  can  tell  you.  So 
doing  Lady  Macbeth  herself  was  only 
moving  a  little  higher  in  scenes 
already  familiar  to  me,  and  I  got  on 
pretty  well. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

We  were  in  Louisville  when  the 
war  broke  out.  People  who  lived  in 
the  Northern  towns  can  have  no  idea 
how  exciting  our  lives  were  down 
there.  Kentucky  was  "  Secesh  "  in 
her  sympathies,  and  naturally  so  for 
many  reasons.  It  used  to  be  said  that 
it  was  the  editor  of  the  Louisville 
Journal  who  kept  the  State  in  the 
Union  by  his  work  and  his  influence. 
Anyway,  she  stayed  in,  but  there  was 
bitter  feeling  everywhere,  separating 
friends  and  families.  Union  flags  and 
Confederate  flags  were  run  up  on  pri- 
vate houses,  and  there  was  a  good  deal 
of  quarrelling  and  free  shooting. 
Across  the  way  from  our  theatre  was 
a  hotel  with  the  usual  bar,  and  it  was 
the  scene  of  many  party  fights.  It 
got  so  that  no  one  minded ;  they 
63 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
simply  said  :  "Another  man  shot," 
and  went  about  their  business.  In 
those  times  of  hot  words  and  quick 
firing  there  was  no  time  to  draw  pis- 
tols, and  they  shot  through  their 
pockets.  Mr.  Gilbert  had  a  little 
property  there  then.  The  man  who 
looked  after  it  was  shot  and  killed  one 
day.  There  was  no  need  to  ask  what 
the  quarrel  was  about. 

We  went  from  Louisville  to  Cov- 
ington,  and  then  to  Cincinnati,  just 
across  the  river.  But  we  were  almost 
as  much  on  the  border  as  ever.  Mr. 
Gilbert  joined  a  company  of  volun- 
teers called  "  The  Queen  City  De- 
fenders," that  was  to  guard  the  town 
and  the  pontoon  bridge,  but  was 
never  meant  to  go  to  the  front.  They 
were  called  out  at  any  alarm,  and 
64 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

sometimes  there  would  be  a  wild  ring- 
ing of  bells,  if  there  was  any  danger 
of  a  raid.  I  remember  once  there 
was  a  great  disturbance  and  fright  at 
night ;  but  it  was  only  a  small  band 
of  young  fellows,  riding  in  to  join  the 
Union  forces,  on  their  own  horses, 
and  with  no  weapons  but  little  guns, 
such  as  they  would  use  for  bird- 
shooting,  and  a  pistol  or  two.  i 
But  we  were  always  having  alarms. 
First  it  would  be  the  rumor  of  a 
Southern  raid  ;  then  of  a  large  North- 
ern force  passing  through,  when  we 
would  all  turn  out  and  feed  them. 
In  any  case  of  that  sort,  martial  law 
would  be  declared  and  every  one 
would  have  to  be  indoors  by  nine  at 
night.  At  such  times  there  was  no 
performance,  of  course  ;  but  at  other 
6s 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

times  our  theatre  would  be  full,  for  in 
such  a  whirl  of  excitement  people 
liked  to  be  constantly  amused.  At  a 
benefit  we  had  in  Louisville,  one  of 
the  town  soldiers,  who  had  just  re- 
turned from  the  front,  recited  "  Bin- 
gen  on  the  Rhine,"  and  was  most 
enthusiastically  received.  He  was 
one  of  Louisville's  special  regiment 
that  had  just  come  home  from  its 
three  years  of  service.  It  had  gone 
out  full,  it  came  back  hardly  fifty 
men,  and  those  bare-footed  and  in 
rags.  Yet  they  could  not  wait  for 
decent  clothes  before  they  re-enlisted. 
Even  when  there  was  no  martial 
law,  the  stores  and  markets  were 
closed  at  ten  in  the  morning,  for  all 
the  men  had  to  drill  so  as  to  be  able 
to  defend  the  town,  if  need  be.  No 

66 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

one  was  spared,  and  it  was  not  safe  to 
be  out  without  some  sort  of  a  certifi- 
cate showing  membership  of  some 
special  company,  for  the  local  bands 
had  a  way  of  impressing  unattached 
men,  and  listening  to  no  protests. 
Once  1  know  there  was  an  alarm,  and 
it  was  before  Mr.  Gilbert  had  either 
his  certificate  or  his  uniform.  He 
snatched  up  a  stage  sword  and  rushed 
out  of  the  house,  only  to  be  scooped 
up  by  a  company  of  city  volunteers. 
He  was  too  clever  to  struggle  with 
them,  and  too  shrewd  to  march  in  the 
middle  of  their  ranks,  as  they  tried  to 
make  him  do.  He  kept  on  the  out- 
side, and  got  the  men  friendly  and 
laughing  with  his  chaff  and  funny 
stories.  He  was  counting  on  a  stable 
he  had  to  pass,  a  place  he  knew  and 
67 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

where  he  was  known.  When  he  got 
opposite  he  watched  his  chance,  and 
scooted  through  and  got  well  away. 
When  he  was  safe  home,  he  told  me 
that  that  was  the  last  time  they 
should  find  him  out  without  protec- 
tion. 

They  were  stirring  times,  and  hard 
times  too,  for  our  salaries  were  cut 
down,  and  all  the  necessaries  of  life 
went  up.  But  it  was  not  all  so  seri- 
ous. For  instance,  our  prompter  at 
that  time  was  a  very  fat  man,  not  tall, 
and  broad  out  of  all  proportion.  He 
was  as  clean  as  he  was  fat — spotlessly, 
unnecessarily  clean.  One  day  he  had 
come  to  the  theatre  in  especial  rig ;  it 
was  midsummer,  and  he  had  on  white 
duck  trousers  and  a  fine  ruffled  shirt 
with  no  coat  or  waistcoat.  We  were 

68 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

having  a  rehearsal  when  there  came  a 
sudden  call  to  all  the  men  in  the 
town  to  help  in  some  earthworks  that 
were  to  be  thrown  up.  Our  promp- 
ter went  with  the  rest,  and  oh,  the 
sight  he  was  at  the  end  of  a  day's 
work  under  a  broiling  sun  !  There 
was  not  a  clean  white  thing  about 
him. 

With  all  the  anxiety  and  excite- 
ment we  were  not  sorry  to  get  away 
in  1864.  I  was  rather  proud,  for 
that  season  I  received  five  good  offers 
to  come  East  from  different  managers. 
One  was  from  Mrs.  John  Drew  in 
Philadelphia,  with  whom  I  had  acted 
in  Chicago,  when  she  was  Mrs. 
Mossop ;  and  one  was  from  Mrs. 
John  Wood  in  New  York.  I  forget 
where  the  other  three  were,  but  I 
69 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
know  there  were  five  in  all.  We  ac- 
cepted Mrs.  John  Wood's.  She 
had  the  Olympic,  Laura  Keene's  old 
theatre — its  site  now  covered  by  the 
business  blocks  numbered  622  and 
624  Broadway — for  three  years,  and 
during  the  greater  part  of  her  man- 
agement I  played  with  her.  It  was 
curious ;  Mr.  Gilbert  had  always 
disliked  the  idea  of  going  to  New 
York,  but  this  time  he  seemed  to 
favor  it,  even  urged  it.  "  It  will  be 
that  much  nearer  home,"  he  said, 
thinking  of  England.  In  two  short 
years  he  had  died  here.  He  lies  in 
Greenwood,  and  our  son  George  is 
there  too.  Another  little  boy  is 
buried  in  Cincinnati.  I  have  often 
thought  that  I  would  bring  him  to 
Greenwood,  to  be  with  his  father  and 
7o 


Mrs.  John   Wood 

From    a  photograph   by    Sarony,   New    York.      In  the 
collection  of  Mrs.  Gilbert. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

brother,  but  he  lies  in  a  beautiful 
spot,  and  I  visit  it  whenever  I  go 
West.  It  is  better  as  it  is,  I  think. 

If  I  had  known  in  those  early  days 
how  strong — and  how  narrow — the 
New  York  theatrical  clique  was,  I 
think  I  should  never  have  dared  face 
it.  But  I  had  not  the  faintest  notion 
of  it,  and  I  got  over  all  the  "  high 
fences  "  before  I  knew  they  existed. 
Wallack's  was  everything  then.  To 
get  into  his  company  was  well-nigh  im- 
possible, and  to  be  out  of  it  was  to  be 
nowhere,  to  many  people's  thinking. 
Fanny  Morant,  who  was  at  Wallack's 
then,  but  joined  Mr.  Daly's  com- 
pany later,  said  to  me  once  :  "Where 
did  you  come  from  ?  Where  did 
you  learn  to  act?"  I  rather  en- 
joyed answering  :  "  Oh,  out  West." 

73 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

"Well,"  she  said,  "we  had  never  heard 
of  you,  we  did  not  know  what  you 
could  do,  or  who  you  were,  and  you 
walked  straight  into  the  affections  of 
New  York,  before  we  knew  what  had 
happened."  All  this  is  not  worth 
quoting,  really,  except  that  it  shows 
that  they  thought  nothing  could  exist 
outside  of  New  York.  John  E. 
Owens — with  whom  I  got  my  train- 
ing in  old  comedy  parts — had  been 
anxious  that  I  should  begin  my  East- 
ern work  in  some  town  like  Boston, 
where  the  prejudice  against  outsiders, 
and  especially  Westerners,  was  not  so 
strong.  "  You  will  work  your  way 
to  the  front  in  New  York,"  he  said ; 
"  there  is  no  fear  about  that,  but  it 
may  take  many  months,  or  a  year 
and  more.  In  Boston  a  few  perform- 

74 


"John   E.  Owens 

From  a  photograph  by  Gurney,  New  York.     In 
the  collection  of  E-vtrt  jfansen  Wendell,  Esq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

ances  will  do  it."  He  was  always  a 
good  friend  of  ours,  and  I  know  now 
that  his  advice  was  good,  too.  But, 
as  it  happened,  it  did  not  apply  to 
my  case,  and,  as  I  said,  Mr.  Gilbert 
favored  New  York. 

We  were  hardly  settled  here  when 
Owens  himself  came  to  New  York 
under  the  management  of  our  old  Cin- 
cinnati manager,  George  Wood,  of 
"Wood's  Theatre,"  who  had  taken  the 
Broadway  Theatre,just  below  the  cor- 
ner of  Broome  Street,  about  which  I 
shall  have  something  to  say  later.  He 
asked  me  to  join  his  company  there, 
but  I  would  not  leave  Mrs.  John 
Wood  as  long  as  she  wanted  me.  No, 
there  was  no  relation  between  the  two 
Woods.  Mrs.  John  Wood  is  an 
Englishwoman,  although  when  she 

77 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

went  back  to  her  own  country,  after 
many  years  here,  she  had  to  combat 
English  prejudice  against  her  "Amer- 
icanisms." She  had  played  in  Eng- 
land as  a  girl,  touring  the  provinces, 
and  appearing  in  Manchester,  where 
she  was  somewhat  of  a  favorite.  So 
she  was  by  adoption,  as  I  was  by  birth, 
"  A  Lancashire  Lass."  Still,  before 
she  married  John  Wood  she  was  do- 
ing light  soubrette  parts,  and  was  not 
thought  to  be  anything  especial. 
When  they  came  over  here,  it  was 
John  Wood  who  was  the  star,  but 
his  wife  soon  came  to  the  front  and 
has  stayed  there.  I  think  she  is  the 
most  absolutely  funny  woman  I  have 
ever  seen,  both  on  and  off  the  stage. 
The  fun  simply  bubbled  up  in  her. 
Then  she  could  sing  and  dance  a  bit, 
78 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

and  in  the  burlesques  and  farces  she 
did,  such  as  "  The  Sleeping  Beauty  " 
and  "  The  Fair  One  with  the  Golden 
Locks,"  she  was  inimitable.  There 
were  certain  parts  of  hers  that  I 
always  loved  to  watch  her  in,  no  mat- 
ter how  often  I  had  seen  her  do  them. 
She  was  a  great  favorite  in  Boston, 
where  she  played  for  many  years  be- 
fore coming  to  New  York.  Later, 
she  went  back  to  London,  and  had 
her  own  theatre  until  quite  recently, 
Only  two  years  ago  (1899)  she  made 
a  hit  in  "  The  Great  Ruby."  Now, 
she  has  left  the  stage  for  good,  she 
says. 

When  I  signed  with  her,  it  was  for 
"  first  old  woman's  "  parts,  and  any 
character  they  thought  not  quite  good 
enough  or  long  enough  for  me  was 

79 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
given  to  my  second.  One  day,  soon 
after  I  began  my  work  at  the  Olym- 
pic, I  went  into  the  green-room,  and 
saw  that  a  play  called  "  The  Spanish 
Princess,"  or  some  such  name,  was 
billed,  and  the  part  of  the  lady's  maid 
was  given  to  my  second.  I  went 
straight  to  the  stage-manager  and  said 
1  thought  that  part  belonged  to  me. 
"  Why,  Mrs.  Gilbert,"  he  said,  "  it 
was  such  a  slight  part,  that  we  thought 
you  would  not  touch  it."  It  was  a 
little  part,  but  there  was  one  scene 
where  the  maid  pretended  to  be  the 
princess,  and  did  a  good  deal  of 
"business"  with  a  cloak,  that  I 
thought  I  could  make  something  of, 
and  I  did.  Mrs.  Wood  was  surprised, 
and  pleased  too,  and  they  arranged 
not  to  cast  a  play  officially  without 
80 


622  Aim  624  BROADWAY. 


FIRST     eNXCtBT    IN    AKBRXCA 
NEW  AND  ORIGINAL    COMEDY 

WrttUa  ky  (k. 

€«»••  BO  ««>»»«»     «»  I*  «„  i  II  ;••-«• 


S  S  E 


MRS.    JOU\    WOOD 

fa  a«T  telebnt-J  imt  aaaMgaa.  taaa-ruartUa  tt 

__  IMnteciaf  »«r  Im  It  •  1  1  OD.  of  woll-k  »•  w» 


First  appearance  of  MRS.  GK  H.  GILBERT, 

Treea  ril  •••  0».ra  Do...   Olieiuattl. 

First  appearance  of  MISS  IiOUIS  &.  MYERS. 

Monday  Evening,  Sept.  19tb,  1864, 

Will  be  produced,  for  the  firet  time  in  Amoriei,  a  new  Com-Jy  entitled 


>.•  «fSio.ij  br  ike  i,tiiri  i.  mi.  .  i 

;  Ik.  I.,!,*  c-"—»  "d  SUilUa'  Kill,  l.u,  ki>  k.W.     Tie  <l^«W«e 

. ,  acnod  to orad  .n  ftido4«.OMp  ..  ktoMiB.  In  d»f  uw«.  to  •uktife  tor  e-feoa  M4 

At  thil   «ci.i..  Ik.  r  nmUr  pl.tten    proouroi   •   7».»K  FronokMi  i.  oar  ferric*  to  ponooaM  lke> 

aataeie.  —  Fiat  "Tb.  Pioloriel  Uutoty  of  la^Uad,*  Vol.  Till.  p^*5>0. 

Baron  Freitenhonan.  innntor  of  Uu  Ilizir  or  Life  and  derotod  to  mjuertoui  >cienc* 

Mr.  I.  H.  Stoddart 
TJr.  Bertrand,  a  French  Emigre Mr.  W.  RoUtoa 

Jnles  D' Artlgnr-  «on  of  Doctor  Bertrand.  the  mock  epy Mr.  B.  T.  Bingold 

Captain  Mortimer.  C.ptain  of  H.  B.  H.  ehip  the  ••  Vigilant" Mr.  T.  B.  Be  r» 

John  Popplcton,  an  amtuur  Sailor Mr.  E.  Lamb 

•t.  Olalr,an  Adfenturer..., Mr.  T.  J.  Hind 

ril'ippi        Mr.  O.  H.  Rockwell 

Barooeu  Frelteohorien.  jealoue  of  myetorj  aid  her  huiband  —  Mri.  O.  H.  Gilbert 

From  Pike'i  Opera  Hoiue.  CmcLnnatti.  her  Grit  appearance. 
ta»ra  Brandon,  bernie«... MUi  E.  Oooraa 

Her  fir.t  appearance. 

Her  fint  appeannoe,  in  whiei  ahe  will  eing  •'  Come  in  and  abut  the  Door." 

Darin,  tie  Fnt  Art. 
The  Tarantella br -• .Mlu  AmutXna^M 

Tk*  OrDbMtra.  during  Uw  •raninc  wiD  nlar  u»  following  entirely   H«w  Muf'A 
arranged  bj  and  under  tie  diraetioa.  of  Thoc.  Baker. 

0».,«ve    Tarl.tr.  oap.>alu  .Ire leaa. 

e}el*a~47haaapaA* wltk  avrei  ••>•!» 

b«.f.tlcaUlectl.a    loSaia.aot. Hi/.teei 

Tk.  aerioreuaoM  will  ogeeUde  wilk  Ike  eueleel  IWMtt.  ealitM 

JENNY  LIND 

Saxon  Bwllitoff  B**rr,  a  SuiaV  t  eurnam'd  the  "  Cock  of  the  Collegt" 

Mr.  W.  DavMg* 

Bb.  Lawrence  Leatherlonci.  a  Tanner.  onaTour Mr.  T.  J.  HJwl 

Mr.  Oranbf  Oa(.  a  Undon  M .nager  in  March  of  .  etar Mr.  E.  Lamb 

B>rr  Scheroot      Mr.  O.  HockwtU 

Borr  Kanuter Mr.  O. 


i  Spittoon 


HerrSolntter... Mr.  Otl» 

MlM  Jenny  teatherlungi.  .1,"  I.md Mn.  Jobo  Woot) 

la  which  aho  will  gin  tier  celebrated  iuilutlonj  of  ««U  kno«n  Operatic  Artnle: 


Programme  of  Airs.  Gilbert's  First  Appearance 
at  a  New  York  Theatre 

From  the  collection  of  Douglas  Taylor ,  Esq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

first  submitting  it  to  me.     That  was 
pretty  good  for  a  beginner. 

I  can't  begin  to  remember  the  parts 
I  did  at  the  Olympic ;  but  I  know 
that  I  began  as  the  Baronessy  in 
"Finesse,"  on  September  19,  1864. 
It  was  there,  too,  that  I  did  Mrs. 
Gamp,\n  "  Martin  Chuzzlewit,"  Betsy 
<Trotwoody  in  "  David  Copperfield," 
and  Mrs.  Wilfer,  in  "  Our  Mu- 
tual Friend."  I  was  the  first 
woman  to  do  Sairy  Gamp,  for  it  had 
always  been  considered  a  man's  part. 
For  me  to  do  it  was  almost  as  much 
of  a  challenge  to  custom  as  for  a 
woman  to  do  Ham/el.  By  the  way, 
although  I  have  never  done  Hamlet, 
I  have  done  Osric.  That,  too,  was 
with  Edwin  Booth.  It  is  a  light, 
silly  part  for  a  man,  anyway,  and  fell 
83 


The  Stage  Remini$cences  of 
quite  naturally  to  a  woman,  when  the 
managers  were  short  of  people.  But 
that  was  long  before  the  Olympic 
days.  Mrs.  Gamp  was  such  a  ques- 
tionable role  for  a  woman  to  take  that 
Mrs.  John  Gilbert,  who  saw  me  for 
the  first  time  in  that  part,  refused  to 
express  any  opinion  of  my  acting, 
saying  it  was  unfair  to  criticise  any 
woman  in  such  a  character  !  Later, 
in  speaking  of  some  other  perfor- 
mance of  mine,  she  said  :  "  All  I  can 
say,  Mrs.  Gilbert,  is  that  you  did  it 
just  as  I  should  have  done  it  myself." 
The  dear  lady,  she  meant  it  as  a  great 
compliment.  Her  husband  ?  In  his 
line,  he  was  the  most  finished  artist  I 
ever  saw.  William  Warren,  the 
Boston  actor,  was  the  nearest  to  him. 
They  were  both  exquisite  gentlemen 
84 


William 


From  a  photograph  by  Rit-z,  Boston.       In   the  collection 
of  Evert  Jansen  Wendell,  Esy. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

of  the  old  school.  It  used  to  seem 
as  if  Sheridan  wrote  his  plays  just  for 
them. 

It  was  during  my  engagement  with 
Mrs.  Wood  that  James  Lewis  came 
to  the  Olympic.  His  first  appearance 
there  was  on  the  night  of  September 
1 8,  1 865,  in  a  little  farce  called  "  Your 
Life's  in  Danger."  He,  too,  was 
from  the  West,  from  Cleveland, 
where  he  had  been  a  great  favorite. 
He  did  not  get  on  in  New  York  at 
first,  for  he  was  very  sensitive,  and 
he  felt  the  strong  clique  that  I  had 
not  known  enough  to  fear.  Then  he 
was  unlucky  in  this  ;  he  was  at  his 
best,  at  that  period,  in  the  old  farces, 
and  these  were  just  going  out  of  vogue 
here.  Toward  the  end  of  the  season 
"  Robert  Macaire  "  was  revived,  and 
87 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

he  did  Jacques  Strop,  and  although 
he  did  it  well,  the  piece  did  not  run 
long,  and  he  soon  went  away  to  Bos- 
ton. It  was  four  years  before  he 
came  back  to  join  Daly's  company, 
when  it  was  first  formed. 

Lewis  wanted  to  do  just  the  parts 
that  he  knew  he  could  do,  and  the 
sympathy  of  the  audience  was  abso- 
lutely necessary  to  him ;  he  could 
not  work  without  it.  He  was  what 
one  calls  "  difficult,"  in  spite  of  his 
naturally  sweet  nature.  Still,  if  he 
put  a  high  value  upon  himself  and 
his  work,  he  proved  his  right  to  do  so. 
We  played  opposite  parts  for  nearly 
thirty  years,  and  I  grew  to  be  very 
fond  of  him.  When  he  died  so  sud- 
denly, I  hardly  had  the  heart  to  take 
up  the  old  roles  again  !  None  of  the 

88 


James  Lewis 

From  a  photograph   by  Bogardus,  Nciv  fork. 
In  the  collection  of  Evert  yanscn  Wendell,  Esj. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

young  men  who  came  on  in  his  old 
parts  knew — or  could  ever  know — 
the  numberless  details  of  business 
that  were  so  familiar  to  us  two. 

When  Mrs.  John  Wood  gave  up 
the  Olympic,  and  left  New  York,  I 
rejoined  my  old  manager,  George 
Wood,  at  the  Broadway  Theatre.  It 
was  New  York's  second  Broadway 
Theatre,  the  first  one,  so  famous  in 
theatrical  annals,  which  stood  on  the 
east  side  of  Broadway,  much  farther 
down  town,  having  been  burned. 
This  new  house  was  built  about  where 
now  is  the  huge  building  numbered 
483  and  485  Broadway,  extending 
back  to  Mercer  Street,  where  was  the 
stage  entrance.  The  place  had  had 
quite  a  history,  beginning  in  1850  as 
Brougham's  Lyceum,  and  passing 

9' 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
later  under  the  management  of  the 
elder  Wallack.  He  kept  it  until 
1861,  when  he  went  up  to  his  new 
theatre  on  Thirteenth  Street  and 
Broadway,  now  the  poor  old  Star. 
From  that  year  until  1864,  when 
George  Wood  took  it,  the  Broadway 
had  half  a  score  of  names,  and  passed 
through  many  hands,  with  a  pretty 
steady  lack  of  success,  growing  out 
of  many  reasons.  It  was  during  Mr. 
Wood's  management  that  the  Worrell 
sisters  produced  their  extravaganza  of 
"  Aladdin."  The  three  sisters,  Sophie, 
Jennie  and  Irene,  were  great  favor- 
ites, in  their  day,  and  simple,  kindly 
people  to  work  with.  1  remember 
that  they  let  me  introduce  a  dance  that 
attracted  a  good  bit  of  attention  ;  and 
yet  dancing  was  their  own  specialty. 
92 


The  Worrell  Sisters 

in  "La  Belle  Helens." 

From  a  photograph   by  Hoivell,  New    York.      In  the 
collection  of  Evert  Jansen  Wendell,  Esq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

One  does  not  have  to  be  in  the  pro- 
fession to  realize  what  that  means. 
Of  the  three  sisters,  who  were  the 
first  to  give  us  opera  bouffe  in  English, 
two  are  still  living,  retired  from  the 
stage  and  settled  in  the  west.  Jennie 
died  a  year  or  two  ago  in  Minnea- 
polis. 

I  played  for  three  years  at  the 
Broadway,  but  the  last  two  were  un- 
der the  management  of  Barney  Wil- 
liams,to  whom  Mr. Wood  transferred 
the  lease  of  the  house  ;  for  although 
he  did  fairly  well  there,  he  was  not 
sorry  to  pass  it  on,  and  the  old  place 
ended  its  career  on  the  night  of  April 
28,  1869,  when  Barney  Williams 
gave  a .  benefit  performance  to  his 
business  manager,  William  A.  Moore. 
Williams  had  not  intended  to  give  up 

95 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
the  house,  and  did  not  believe  the 
owners  were  in  earnest  when  they 
threatened  to  tear  down  the  old  build- 
ing and  put  up  stores  on  its  site  if  he 
refused  to  pay  a  higher  rent.  But  he 
found,  later,  that  they  did  mean  it, 
and  he  found  himself  out  of  a  theatre. 
It  was  under  his  management  that 
"  Caste  "  was  first  brought  out  here 
in  1867.  William  Davidge  did  old 
Eccles^  Mrs.  Chanfrau  and  Mrs. 
Florence  were  Esther  and  Polly,  and 
Mr.  Florence  was  George  d'Elroy, 
while  1  was  the  Marchioness.  By  the 
way,  the  modern  talk  about  marriage 
interfering  with  an  actress's  popu- 
larity does  not  seem  to  apply  to  those 
old  days.  All  of  us  in  this  cast  were 
married  women,  and  no  one  valued 
our  work  the  less.  The  Marchioness 
96 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

was  the  first  important  character  I 
had  created  in  New  York,  and  she 
got  good  notices.  I  always  had  real 
sympathy  for  the  fine  old  lady,  with 
her  long  tale  from  Froissart.  It  was 
a  pretty  play,  and  had  the  success  it 
deserved. 

I  always  used  to  say  that  I  played 
with  Forrest  in  his  last  engagement  in 
New  York.  That  was  at  this  same 
Broadway  Theatre.  But  they  tell 
me  that  he  played  a  short  engage- 
ment at  Niblo's  Garden  afterward  ;  a 
few  nights  only,  but  just  enough  to 
spoil  the  point  of  my  story!  How- 
ever, he  played  for  six  weeks  at  the 
Broadway  in  '67,  doing  all  his  great 
parts,  though  not  with  his  old 
vigor,  for  he  had  been  ill,  and  seemed 
broken  and  old.  But  his  very  weak- 

97 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
ness  added  a  pathos  to  his  work  that 
it  had  lacked  before,  and  they  say 
that  his  King  Lear  was  most  touch- 
ing at  this  time.  I  did  not  act  with 
him  in  that  play,  and,  indeed,  they 
spared  me  as  much  as  they  could,  for 
my  husband  had  just  died,  and  my 
boy  was  still  very  ill.  But  I  was  the 
Queen  in  Mr.  Forrest's  one  perform- 
ance of  "  Hamlet"  during  this  en- 
gagement, and  I  admired  his  render- 
ing. In  the  earlier  days  his  Hamlet 
was  too  robust,  and  it  had  never  been 
among  his  great  successes.  But  at 
the  time  of  which  I  speak  it  was  quite 
perfect,  to  my  thinking. 

He  opened  this  engagement  with 
"  Virginius,"  and  I  was  cast  for  Servia. 
As  I  entered  and  began  my  lines  at 
rehearsal,  he  said,  quietly  :  "  That's 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

right."  From  him  that  meant  a 
great  deal,  for  although  he  did  not 
storm  about  as  much  as  people  say 
he  did,  he  seldom  praised.  He 
wanted  intelligence  and  care  from 
those  who  supported  him,  and  it  was 
probably  stupidity  and  indifference 
that  caused  the  rages  we  have  heard 
so  much  about.  Obstinacy  annoyed 
him  beyond  everything  else.  They 
tell  a  story  of  a  woman  who  was  to 
have  been  the  Emelia  to  his  Othello, 
and  who  would  kneel  to  the  audience, 
and  protest  her  innocence  with  her 
arms  in  the  air  in  the  old-fashioned 
way,  and  he  could  not  get  her  to  do 
it  in  any  other  way,  or  even  to  look 
up  at  him.  Now  he  was  a  naturalist 
in  his  work,  one  of  the  first  of  his 
profession  to  step  outside  the  tradi- 

99 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
tions,  and  in  this  particular  case  he 
lost  all  patience — he  could  use  an 
oath  ortwo  when  he  was  too  much  tried 
— and  it  all  ended  in  his  giving  the 
part  to  someone  else.  I  did  Emelia 
at  the  Broadway,  and  strained  my 
voice  in  the  role,  and  so  it  came  about 
that  they  borrowed  Madame  Ponisi 
from  Wallack  to  do  Lady  Macbeth. 
I  forget  the  order  in  which  Forrest 
gave  his  plays,  but  I  think  I  did 
nothing  after  the  Emelia,  but  before 
that  I  had  done  the  Widow  Cade  to 
his  Jack  Cade,  and  the  Lady  Anne  to 
his  Richard  III.  I  had  played  that 
role  before  with  Forrest,  in  my  earlier 
days.  He  was  then  at  his  best  physi- 
cally, and  had  the  name  of  having  a 
tremendous  temper,  but  I  never  saw 
him  angry  without  cause.  He  was 


Madame  Ponisi 

as  Lady  Macbeth 

From  a  photograph   by  C.  D.  Fredricks  &  Co.,  Neiv 
York.      In  the  collection  of  Evert  Jansen  Wendell^  Esy. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

very  muscular,  and  could  pick  a 
man  up  and  throw  him  off  the  stage 
if  he  liked.  In  "  Damon  and  Pythias" 
he  really  had  to  do  this,  and  if  the 
man  had  been  stupid,  or  had  done 
anything  Forrest  did  not  like,  he  was 
apt  to  get  a  bad  tumble.  I  know  it 
got  so  that  the  men  did  not  like  to 
take  that  part,  for  it  might  happen 
that  they  would  be  genuinely  pitched 
off  the  stage,  and  they  never  knew 
how  they  would  land. 

It  was  once  in  those  earlier  days  that 
Mr.  Forrest  had  to  have  some  one  to 
do  a  sword  combat  with  him,  and 
Mr.  Gilbert  was  selected.  My  hus- 
band was  a  very  slender  man,  and 
what  with  all  the  stories  of  Forrest's 
temper  and  strength,  we  were  rather 
nervous.  But  everything  went  off 
103 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
all  right ;  Mr.  Gilbert  was  graceful 
and  agile,  and  he  knew  his  business. 
After  the  performance  Mr.  Forrest 
sent  for  him  to  his  dressing-room  and 
complimented  him.  It  was  a  most 
unusual  thing  for  him  to  do,  every- 
body told  us.  Yet  to  us  he  was 
kind,  always,  and  his  immense  vitality 
was  very  helpful  to  those  who  worked 
with  him.  He  was  perhaps  the  most 
famous  person — all  told — with  whom 
I  ever  acted.  No,  I  never  acted  with 
Charlotte  Cushman,  but  I  met  her, 
and  talked  with  her  once  in  Glasgow. 
She  and  her  sister  Susan,  who  did 
"Juliet  to  her  Romeo ^  and  was  almost 
as  good  an  actress  as  the  more  famous 
sister,  were  playing  there. 

Charlotte  Cushman  told  me  of  her 
own  rendering  of  Meg  Merrilies,  one 
104 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

of  her  strongest  parts.  By  the  way, 
she  always  refused  to  put  on  the  first 
part  of  the  play,  where  Meg  appears 
as  a  young  woman,  for  she  maintained 
that  two  separate  women  were  needed 
to  show  the  two  stages  of  Megs  life. 
It  was  in  the  earlier  stage  that  Miss 
Rehan  was  so  charming,  when  she 
did  the  part  not  so  many  years  ago. 
But  the  play  was  much  modified 
then,  and  Meg  was  more  the  Spanish 
gypsy  than  the  weird  Scottish  peas- 
ant. It  was  in  that  production  by 
Mr.  Daly  that  I  had  my  little  dance 
as  the  Widow  McCandlish^  but  in  the 
old  days  I  did  Meg  herself.  It  was 
then  that  I  remembered  how  Char- 
lotte Cushman  told  me  she  had  been 
used  to  chant  the  song  in  the  part, 
for  she  could  not  sing  a  note,  and  did 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
not  like  to  have  anyone  sing  for  her 
behind  the  scenes.  After  all,  that 
singing  behind  the  scenes  is  a  very 
false  sort  of  thing  to  do,  and  the 
audience  is  never  deceived. 

A  certain  Englishman,  named  Bliss, 
came  to  star  in  this  country.  This 
was  long  before  my  New  York  days, 
you  understand.  Bliss  was  a  famous 
Dandle  Dinmont,  and  I  had  to  sup- 
port him  as  Meg.  I  could  not  sing 
at  all,  and  I  was  very  ambitious  to 
try  Miss  Cushman's  plan  of  chanting 
the  lines  to  the  accompaniment  of  a 
few  low  chords  from  the  orchestra. 
Now  I  am  so  made  that  I  cannot 
take  a  pitch  from  an  orchestra,  or 
from  any  single  instrument ;  the  only 
note  I  can  copy  is  that  of  the  human 
voice.  So  I  got  a  girl  who  had  a 

106 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

musical  ear  to  coach  me  on  the  sly, 
for  I  knew  that  my  husband,  who 
was  stage-manager  then,  would  not 
like  the  idea  of  my  challenging  com- 
parison with  Charlotte  Cushman. 
But  I  was  forever  trying  to  do  the 
things  that  were  almost  beyond  my 
reach,  and  I  suppose  it  is  that  which 
has  kept  me  going.  It  was  not  until 
rehearsal  that  my  husband  suspected 
what  I  had  been  plotting.  I  can  see 
his  face  now,  as  he  stood  on  one  side, 
superintending  things  ;  when  the  or- 
chestra slowed  down  for  me  and  he 
realized  what  was  coming,  he  turned 
on  his  heel  and  went  straight  off  out 
of  sight.  I  heard  him  say  under  his 
breath  :  "  My  God,  she's  going  to 
try  it !  "  I  suppose  my  nervousness 
added  the  needed  quaver  to  my  voice, 
107 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

for  it  certainly  sounded  like  that  of  a 
very  old  woman.  When  I  was  fin- 
ished the  fiddlers  in  the  orchestra 
beat  softly  on  the  backs  of  their  in- 
struments with  their  bows — that  is 
their  form  of  applause — and  as  for 
me,  I  went  back  up  the  stage,  and 
had  a  good  cry. 


Mrs.    Gilbert 

Taken  in  l86j,  -when  Mrs. Gilbert  was  with  Mrs. 
jfoAn  Wood.  from  a  photograph  by  Brady,  Washing- 
ton, D.  C.  In  the  collection  of  Mrs.  Gilbert. 


II 

IT  was  in  1869  that  Mr.  Daly 
opened  his  first  Fifth  Avenue 
Theatre,  in  Twenty-fourth 
Street,  where  now  is  the  Madison 
Square  Theatre.  It  was  in  this  the- 
atre that  Mr.  Daly  first  showed  New 
York  what  he  could  do  as  a  manager. 
The  little  hall  that  had  stood  there 
next  the  Fifth  Avenue  Hotel  had 
been  turned  into  a  theatre  by  "Jim  " 
Fisk,  and  taken  by  John  Brougham 
for  his  second  Lyceum.  Brougham 
was  no  business  man,  and  Fisk  was. 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

Some  difficulty  arose,  and  the  de- 
lightful old  actor  walked  out  of  the 
house,  never  to  return  as  manager. 
Mr.  Daly  stepped  into  his  place  to 
make  a  success  of  this  second  Ly- 
ceum, as  Wallack  had  made  a  success 
out  of  the  failure  of  the  first  Ly- 
ceum, down  near  Broome  Street, 
nearly  twenty  years  before. 

Mr.  Daly  had  begun  life  in  this 
town  as  a  journalist  on  the  staff  of 
the  Courier.  Even  then  he  was  try- 
ing to  write  plays,  and  had  to  live 
down  the  disappointment  of  having 
his  earliest  attempts  refused,  mislaid 
in  managers'  desks,  and  forgotten  al- 
together. He  got  his  first  chance 
when  he  adapted  "  Leah  the  For- 
saken "  from  a  German  play,  for  Miss 
Bateman,  who  was  starring  in  this 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

country  under  her  father's  manage- 
ment. It  was  Mr.  Bateman,  by  the 
way,  whogave  to  Henry  Irving  his  first 
opening  in  London.  "Leah"  was  a 
success  in  this  country  and  in  England, 
where  Bateman  produced  it  atthe  Adel- 
phi  Theatre  in  1863.  The  play  is  still 
a  favorite,  though  many  have  forgotten 
that  it  was  the  first  of  Mr.  Daly's 
adaptations  from  the  German.  He 
also  dramatized  Charles  Reade's 
"Griffith  Gaunt"  for  Smith  and 
Baker,  who  had  the  New  York  The- 
atre on  Broadway  for  a  time.  Lewis 
Baker  had  been  my  manager  in  Lou- 
isville and  Cincinnati,  and  his  daugh- 
ter was  to  be  the  present  Mrs.  John 
Drew. 

As  for  the  New  York  Theatre,  we 
were  all  to  know  it  better  under  Mr. 

"3 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
Daly's  own  management  in  1873.  It 
was  in  this  theatre,  by  the  way,  that 
"  Under  the  Gaslight,"  Mr.  Daly's 
first  original  piece,  was  brought  out. 
It  ran  for  fifty  nights,  and  was  revived 
within  a  very  short  time.  It  not  only 
stood  that  revival,  but  many,  many 
others,  and  is  alive  to-day.  I  have 
been  told  that  it  was  for  this  play  of 
"  Under  the  Gaslight "  that  Mr. 
Daly  invented  the  modern  spectacu- 
lar theatre  poster.  He  produced  his 
second  original  play,  "A  Flash  of 
Lightning,"  at  the  Broadway,  while  I 
was  still  at  that  theatre.  That  was 
the  first  time  I  ever  saw  "  The  Gov- 
ernor." 

After  all  this  early  experience,  Mr. 
Daly  saw  his  chance  to  get  the  Fifth 
Avenue  Theatre  for  his  own,  and  it 
114 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

proved  the  beginning  of  thirty  years 
of  all  kinds  of  managerial  work. 
During  those  years  there  was  hardly 
an  actress  or  actor  of  any  note  who 
did  not,  at  one  time  or  another,  appear 
under  his  direction.  He  did  every- 
thing, from  "  handling  "  big  stars  to 
running  a  stock  company  and  setting 
up  comic  operas.  The  big  stars  often 
cost  him  more  than  they  brought  in. 
Once  I  know,  when  he  was  managing 
some  one  very  important  and  very 
expensive,  it  so  happened  that  we  of 
the  stock  company,  who  were  also 
"  on  the  road,"  had  to  pass  through 
the  car  where  Mr.  Daly  and  his  star 
were  sitting,  to  get  to  our  own  part  of 
the  train,  and  they  made  joking  pre- 
tence of  not  knowing  us,  and  of  our 
being  beneath  notice  anyway.  As  I 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
passed  the  "  Governor  "  I  whispered 
to  him  :  "  You  needn't  snub  us  ;  we're 
making  more  money  for  you  than 
your  star,  and  you  know  it."  And 
indeed  we  were. 

For  my  part,  I  have  never  believed 
in  the  big-star  system  of  modern  days. 
They  absorb  so  much  money  with 
their  enormous  salaries  that  it  is  im- 
possible to  support  them  properly 
and  yet  make  any  money.  My  first 
manager,  John  B.  Rice,  of  Chicago, 
always  refused  to  have  Forrest  play  in 
his  theatre,  although  the  two  men 
were  good  friends.  He  reasoned  this 
way  :  Forrest  drew  good  money  for 
the  week  or  fortnight  of  his  stay,  but 
he  ruined  the  business  of  the  theatre 
for  weeks  after  and  weeks  before  his 
visit.  He  was  so  great  an  actor  that 

116 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

before  he  came  everybody  was  saving 
up  money  to  see  him  ;  and  after  he 
had  gone,  it  was  some  time  before 
anyone  would  pay  any  money  to  see 
an  inferior  man.  Forrest  understood 
the  position  entirely,  and  the  two  men 
never  quarrelled  over  the  fact  that 
each  chose  to  make  his  fortune  in  his 
own  way. 

It  is  impossible  to  say  when  Mr. 
Daly  began  to  learn  his  business,  but 
he  was  always  at  it,  from  the  days 
when  he  organized  his  brothers 
and  their  playmates  into  a  dramatic 
company,  and  gave  plays  in  the 
smoke-house  of  his  early  home  in 
North  Carolina,  and  later  in  the 
back-parlor  of  his  mother's  house  in 
Virginia.  Even  then  he  wrote  the 
plays,  gave  out  the  parts,  and  man- 
117 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

aged  the  whole  thing  with  an  iron 
hand.  Mr.  Daly  never  told  me  a 
word  of  all  this — he  rarely  talked 
about  himself  anyway — but  at  our 
regular  New- Year  dinners  of  later 
years,  Judge  Daly,  his  famous  bro- 
ther, often  gave  us  anecdotes  of  their 
common  childhood.  I  remember  he 
told  us  once  that  Augustin  never 
acted  in  these  boyish  plays,  but  would 
often  rush  in  among  them  all  and 
show  them  how  to  do  things.  And 
often,  too,  "  he  would  flare  up  and 
discharge  the  lot  of  us.  And  we 
would  have  to  come  round  to  his 
way  of  thinking,  and  eat  humble  pie, 
before  we  could  get  engaged  again," 
to  quote  one  of  Judge  Daly's  stories. 
In  all  their  games  and  plays  Augustin 
was  undisputed  master,  and  he  rode 

118 


William  Davidge 

From  a  photograph   by  Barony,    New    York, 
the  collection  of  Evert  jfamen  Wendell,  Esy. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

them  all,  though  he  was  never  will- 
ing to  "  be  horse  "  himself. 

Yet  I  have  seen  him  on  his  hands 
and  knees,  making  a  most  obedient 
horse  for  his  own  boys.  He  was 
devoted  to  those  two  boys,  planning 
their  future  with  more  care  and 
thought  even  than  he  put  into  the 
plays  on  which  all  their  fortunes  de- 
pended. One  of  the  children  prom- 
ised to  follow  in  his  father's  footsteps, 
for  only  the  Christmas  before  he 
died,  he  had  written  a  little  play  that 
was  given  at  home,  with  their  father 
and  mother  in  the  audience.  I  have 
often  thought  that  Mr.  Daly  would 
have  been  a  very  different  man  if  his 
boys  had  lived.  But  they  both  died  on 
the  same  day,  one  in  the  morning 
and  one  at  night.  It  was  malignant 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
diphtheria.      They   were  manly  little 
fellows  of  perhaps  eight  and  ten,  or  a 
little  older.    That  was  all  a  long  time 
ago. 

The  first  Fifth  Avenue  Theatre 
opened  with  a  good  piece,  Tom  Rob- 
ertson's "  Play,"  and  a  good  com- 
pany, made  up  of  E.  L.  Davenport, 
William  Davidge,  James  Lewis, 
George  Clark,  Agnes  Ethel,  Fanny 
Davenport,  Mrs.  Chanfrau,  and  others 
famous  then  and  now.  "  Play  "  was 
followed  by  one  or  two  regulation 
pieces,  and  by  a  starring  season  of 
Mrs.  Scott-Siddons  in  Shakespeare 
and  old  comedies.  I  believe  "  Caste  " 
was  revived  for  a  time.  "  Caste " 
was  not  so  well  done  with  Daly  as 
with  Barney  Williams ;  many  little 
niceties  that  would  naturally  surround 


The  Late  Augustin  Daly  and  his  Two  Boys 

From  a  photograph  by  Sarony,  Neiv  York.      In  the  collection  of  Mrs.  Gilbert. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

the  Marchioness  were  overlooked. 
Wallack  had  bought  the  rights  of 
the  play  in  this  country,  but  Florence 
produced  his  version  first  at  the 
Broadway.  A  good  deal  of  litigation 
grew  out  of  it,  and  Florence  claimed 
that  he  had  memorized  the  play,  line 
for  line,  during  the  performances  he 
had  seen  in  England.  He  certainly 
had  all  the  "  business,"  and  if  anyone 
had  sold  or  given  him  the  play 
"  under  the  rose,"  the  secret  was  kept 
wonderfully  well.  In  the  end  the 
courts  here  decided  in  his  favor,  for 
there  was  no  copyright  law  or  any- 
thing like  it  to  protect  Wallack,  and 
Florence  had  been  the  first  to  pro- 
duce the  piece,  and  it  was  well  pro- 
duced. Florence  used  to  say  all  the 
other  parts  were  better  done  than  his. 
1*5 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
A  remark  rather  more  modest  than 
true. 

Mr.  Daly  followed  his  revival  of 
"  Caste  "  with  "  Frou-frou."  That 
was  his  first  important  adaptation  from 
the  French,  and  it  was  followed  by 
many  others  before  he  again  turned 
to  Germany  for  his  originals.  I  fancy 
that  he  read  neither  French  nor  Ger- 
man ;  I  know  that  he  spoke  neither. 
But  he  used  to  have  a  literal  transla- 
tion made  of  the  play  he  wished  to 
use,  and  then  he  would  turn  it  and 
twist  it  about,  fitting  the  parts  to  the 
members  of  his  company,  and  adapt- 
it  all  to  his  audience.  In  "  Frou- 
frou," for  instance,  the  Baroness  de 
Cambrai,  the  part  I  did,  was  a  young 
woman  in  the  original,  only  a  few  years 
older  than  Frou-frou  herself,  but  of 

1*6 


William  Florence 

From  a  photograph  by  1.  Gurney,  Neiv  fork.      In 
(he  collection  of  Evert  jfansen  Wendell,  Esy. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

the  world  worldly.  Mr.  Daly  brought 
her  up  more  nearly  to  my  real  age, 
while  retaining  all  the  worldliness  of 
the  character.  And  he  did  it  so  well 
and  so  thoroughly  that  never  a  word 
remained  in  my  lines  to  give  a  hint 
of  the  younger  woman. 

After  "  Frou-frou  "  came  "  Man 
and  Wife,"  based  on  Wilkie  Collins's 
novel.  Mr.  Daly  had  commissioned 
Mr.  Collins  to  dramatize  the  book. 
.Now  Mr.  Daly  wanted  everything 
just  when  he  wanted  it,  and  would 
stand  no  delays,  and  English  people 
don't  work  on  those  lines.  At  last 
Mr.  Daly  got  tired  of  waiting  for  this 
particular  play,  and  made  one  of  his 
own  from  the  book.  There  was  no 
difficulty  with  Mr.  Collins  about  it, 
I  believe,  for  Mr.  Daly  wrote  him 
129 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

quite  courteously  that,  if  the  play  or- 
dered did  not  come  to  hand  at  a  cer- 
tain date,  he  would  be  obliged  to  use 
his  own  version.  And  he  did.  I 
suppose  that,  so  far  as  any  contract 
was  concerned,  Mr.  Collins  had 
broken  it,  and  certainly  there  was  no 
law  in  those  days  to  protect  his  book 
from  being  used  over  here ;  but  when 
the  piece  proved  to  be  a  success,  Mr. 
Daly  sent  him  a  thousand  dollars. 
Just  one  little  point  to  show  how  keen 
Mr.  Daly's  sense  of  dramatic  value 
was.  Hester  Detbridge,  my  part  in 
the  play,  he  made  as  prominent  as  he 
possibly  could.  Indeed,  it  became 
the  part  in  the  piece,  for  he  saw  how 
much  could  be  done  with  the  weird 
creature  who,  in  her  pretended  dumb- 
ness, never  said  a  word,  yet  saw  and 
130 


Miss  Clara  Morris 


From  a  photograph    by  Saron\'t  Ne-w '  fort.      In 
the  collection  of  Evert  jf  arisen  Wendell,  Esq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

heard  everything,  and,  in  a  way,  con- 
trolled a  good  deal  of  the  action  of 
the  play.  Mr.  Collins,  on  the  other 
hand,  left  Hester  entirely  out  of  his 
version. 

"Man  and  Wife"  led  to  a  modifi- 
cation of  our  company.  Agnes  Ethel 
had  become  such  a  favorite  in  "Frou- 
frou" that  Mr.  Daly  was  anxious  to 
have  her  take  the  part  of  Anne  Sylves- 
ter, the  principal  emotional  character 
in  this  new  piece  ;  while  Clara  Mor- 
ris, a  recent  recruit,  was  put  in  for  the 
second  part — what  is  known  as  the 
"  comic  relief."  Miss  Ethel's  role 
was  that  of  a  young  girl,  deceived  by  a 
Scotch  marriage,  you  know.  The 
general  attitude  of  mind  toward  all 
that  sort  of  thing  was  so  different 
then  that  her  friends  and  advisers  pre- 
133 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
vailed  upon  her  to  refuse  the  part, 
even  if  it  meant  her  final  withdrawal 
from  the  company.  Miss  Morris 
was  at  once  put  in  Miss  Ethel's  place, 
and  Fanny  Davenport  was  given  the 
comic  part,  making  certainly  a  much 
more  complete  cast  than  that  origin- 
ally intended ;  for  Clara  Morris  had 
in  her  the  real  stuff  of  an  emotional 
actress,  and  Fanny  Davenport  had  in 
those  days  a  light,  pretty  touch  in  a 
merry  part. 

Fanny  Davenport  was  with  us  for 
several  years,  and  worked  her  way 
steadily  through  what  were  then  the 
regulation  stages  from  comic  cham- 
bermaid to  leading  lady.  She  was 
the  only  one  of  her  father's  children 
who  inherited  his  talent  to  any  great 
extent,  though  the  others  have  done 

'34 


Miss  Agnes  Ethel 

From  a  photograph   by   Sarony,   New    York.      In 
the  collection  of  Evert  Janun  Wendell,  Esq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

good  work.  E.  L.  Davenport  was  a 
wonderfully  interesting  man,  a  curi- 
ously fine  nature,  a  student  and  a  gen- 
tleman. He  was  a  wonderfully 
versatile  actor,  too,  but  that  by  no 
means  follows  as  a  necessary  con- 
clusion. 

After  "  Man  and  Wife "  came  a 
star  engagement  of  Charles  Mathews, 
and  then  another  play  founded  on  a 
novel  of  Wilkie  Collins,  "  No 
Name."  In  the  dramatizing  of  this 
the  author  assisted  Mr.  Daly,  so  you 
see  there  was  no  ill  feeling  over  the 
matter  of  "  Man  and  Wife."  Bron- 
son  Howard's  rattling  comedy,  "  Sar- 
atoga," was  the  first  native  piece  that 
Mr.  Daly  produced,  and  it  held  the 
stage  for  a  good  many  nights.  It 
crossed  the  ocean,  took  an  English 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
name,  "  Brighton,"  won  Mr.  How- 
ard an  English  wife,  and  became  a 
favorite  play  in  Charles  Wyndham's 
repertoire.  Indeed,  it  is  only  a  few 
years  since  he  revived  it  with  distinct 
success.  But  we,  who  knew  it  first  in 
its  youth,  like  to  think  of  it  as  it  was 
before  any  changes  were  made. 

Then  came  "  The  Savage  and  the 
Maiden,"  "suggested,"  as  the  play-bill 
said,  "  by  a  chapter  in  *  Nicholas 
Nickleby,'"  and  I  did  Ninetta  Crum- 
mies, the  Infant  Phenomenon,  to  Lewis's 
Savage.  No  one  needs  to  be  introduced 
to  the  elderly  infant  of  the  Crummies 
company,  but  few  of  my  friends  would 
recognize  me,  now,  in  that  low-necked 
white  muslin  frock,  those  pantalettes 
and  ankle-ties,  with  two  long  plaits  of 
hair  down  my  back.  And  "Jimmie" 
138 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

Lewis  as  the  Savage!  I  lent  him  an 
old  wig  that  I  had  worn  long  before, 
in  the  performance  of  "  Aladdin  and 
the  Wonderful  Lamp,"  at  the  Broad- 
way, a  tremendous  affair  with  two  long 
braids,  that  had  been  wired  so  that 
they  stood  high  above  the  head,  and 
then  bent  forward.  I  remember  that 
as  part  of  that  head-dress  Mr.  Gilbert 
and  I  had  taken  huge  pins,  as  long  as 
the  modern  hat-pin,  covered  their 
heads  with  tinsel,  and  stuck  them 
round  like  a  great  halo  of  gems.  I 
lent  those  to  Lewis,  too,  and  he  was 
an  object!  Then  we  did  the  regula- 
tion "  Nickleby  "  act — Davidge  was 
a  perfect  Crummies — supplemented  by 
my  old  dances  from  "  Pocahontas " 
and  some  new  suggestions  from  Mr. 
Daly.  I  know  he  wanted  us  to  do 
139 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

some  funny  business  with  a  table. 
When  Lewis  was  chasing  me  I  was 
to  run  under  it,  while  Lewis  was  to 
get  over  it.  In  showing  us  how  he 
wanted  it  done  the  "  Governor  "  was 
all  over  the  stage,  and  seemed  to  be 
on  the  table  and  under  it  at  the  same 
time.  It  was  thorough-going  farce, 
of  a  kind  that  seems  to  have  died  out. 
What  makes  it  pathetically  comic  to 
me  now  was  that  on  one  night,  when 
we  were  playing  it,  my  boy,  who  was 
a  member  of  the  Seventy-first  Regi- 
ment, was  called  out,  with  his  com- 
rades, to  put  down  some  sort  of  riot 
up  Harlem  way.  And  while  he  was 
in  danger  of  being  shot,  or  at  least 
hurt,  at  any  moment,  there  was  I  jig- 
ging about  in  a  short  muslin  frock. 
As  soon  as  I  was  free  I  rushed  round 
140 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

to  the  armory  of  the  regiment — it 
was  in  Sixth  Avenue  then — but  could 
get  no  word  of  him.  By  the  next 
morning,  though,  when  Fanny  Mor- 
ant  came  round  to  comfort  me,  think- 
ing that  the  G.  H.  Gilbert,  who  had 
been  shot,  was  my  son,  I  knew 
that  he  was  safe.  That  is  my  last 
very  distinct  recollection  of  the  first 
Fifth  Avenue  Theatre,  though  I 
know  Mr.  Daly's  original  play,  "Di- 
vorce," had  a  good  run  there.  On 
the  afternoon  of  January  i,  1873,  not 
long  after  the  matinee  audience  had 
dispersed,  the  little  theatre  was  burned 
out,  and  we  were  homeless. 

By  that  time  we  were  too  success- 
ful, and  too  popular,  I  am  glad  to 
say,  to  be  allowed  to  be  idle,  and  Mr. 
Daly  was  not  long  in  finding  some 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
sort  of  shelter  for  us.  He  took  the 
old  New  York  Theatre  on  Broad- 
way, the  scene  of  his  own  first  success 
as  a  playwright,  and,  in  sixteen  days, 
had  it  thoroughly  overhauled  and  put 
in  order  for  us.  It  had  been  a  Uni- 
tarian church,  and  had  passed  through 
many  hands  and  odd  fortunes  since 
its  congregation  had  given  it  up. 
We  used  to  say,  in  somewhat  disre- 
spectful fun,  that  we  had  to  dress  in 
among  the  gravestones.  The  old 
place  stood  on  Broadway,  opposite 
Waverley  Place,  and  the  "  Old  Lon- 
don Street "  was  built  on  its  site.  I 
am  not  sure  but  that  a  part  of  the 
walls,  still  standing  there,  are  the 
walls  of  the  old  theatre,  and  even, 
perhaps,  of  the  old  church.  It  was 
numbered  728,  and  that  number  re- 
142 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

From  a  photograph  by   H.  Robber,    Chicago.      In  the  collection   of  Even  jfamcn 
Wendell,  Esy. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

mains  there.  It  clings,  also,  in  the 
memories  of  all  good  New  Yorkers 
as  the  title  of  one  of  the  prettiest 
plays  brought  out  in  the  present 
Daly's  Theatre.  We  did  that  same 
play  in  London  afterward,  under  its 
secondary  title,  "  Casting  the  Boom- 
erang." The  English  courts  refused 
to  allow  Mr.  Daly  to  keep  the  origi- 
nal title,  since  it  had  already  been 
used  in  England  for  another  version 
of  the  same  play  that  had  been  pro- 
duced there  with  small  success. 

It  is  only  my  impression  that  Mr. 
Daly  got  the  name  for  this  play  from 
this  number,  but  I  guess  I  am  right. 
He  took  his  names  from  everywhere, 
and  always  had  a  string  of  them  for 
plays  and  characters.  We  got  so 
that  we  were  all  on  the  lookout  for 
us 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

them,  as  we  went  through  the  streets, 
and  would  often  call  out :  "  There's 
a  queer  name,  Governor!"  He  found 
some  very  funny  ones  for  "  Jimmie  " 
Lewis  and  me.  "  Dollars  and  Sense" 
was  one  of  his  best  titles,  I  think.  I 
know  when  he  was  trying  to  find  a 
name  for  that  particular  piece  he  read 
a  whole  list  of  titles  to  us  once  at 
breakfast,  and  I  said  :  "  Oh,  I  like 
that  one."  Then  it  was  spelled 
"  Dollars  and  Cents,"  and  it  was 
Judge  Daly  who  suggested  the 
change.  "  Let  the  old  man  keep  his 
dollars,"  he  said,  "but  the  old  woman 
has  the  sense." 

We  were    at   the  old  New    York 

Theatre  only  from  January  to  June, 

in  1873.     By  that  time   the  second 

Fifth  Avenue  Theatre,  on  Broadway 

146 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

at  the  corner  of  Twenty-eighth  Street, 
had  been  built,  or  made  over,  for 
Mr.  Daly. 

Among  the  stars  at  the  second 
Fifth  Avenue  Theatre,  we  had  Edwin 
Booth  in  1875,  not  l°ng  a^ter  n's 
attempt  to  run  his  own  theatre  had 
ended  so  disastrously.  He  was 
warmly  greeted,  and  the  New  York 
people  did  their  best  to  show  their 
admiration  and  sympathy  for  him. 
Everyone  knows  the  history  of  his 
later  professional  years  too  well  for 
me  to  retell  it  here,  but  present  play- 
goers will  be  interested  to  know  that 
when  Booth  did  "  Hamlet "  under 
Mr.  Daly's  management  at  this 
period,  Maurice  Barrymore  was  the 
Laertes  and  John  Drew  the  Guilden- 
stern.  Georgie  Drew,  John's  sister, 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

and  later  Barrymore's  wife,  was  also 
in  the  company  at  this  time.  Charles 
Coghlan  tried  to  do  "  Hamlet "  at 
this  same  theatre,  at  one  of  his  bene- 
fits. He  was  our  leading  man  at  one 
time,  and  a  great  favorite,  but  the 
very  manner  and  finish,  that  made 
him  such  a  success  in  the  modern 
society  pieces  of  our  stock-company, 
worked  against  him  as  Hamlet,  and 
his  was  a  curiously  self-controlled, 
passionless  Prince  of  Denmark. 

Before  Booth,  Carlotta  Leclercq 
had  been  the  star  for  one  season,  ap- 
pearing in  "  Pygmalion  and  Galatea" 
and  "  The  Palace  of  Truth,"  two 
plays  written  by  W.  S.  Gilbert  for  the 
Kendals.  Carlotta  Leclercq  had  been 
Fechter's  leading  lady.  It  is  only  a 
few  years  now  since  she  died  in  Lon- 
148 


Edwin  Booth 

From  a  photograph  by  F.  Gutekunst,  Philadel- 
phia, Pa.  In  the  collection  of  Evert  Jansen 
Wendell,  Esq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

don,  but  it  is  a  long  time  since  she 
appeared  on  any  stage,  save  for  one 
or  two  short  London  engagements. 
The  only  other  famous  name  among 
Mr.  Daly's  stars  at  this  time  is  that 
of  Adelaide  Neilson,  who  played  her 
regular  repertoire  in  the  theatre  in 
1877. 

But  the  real  attraction  of  these 
years,  from  '74  to  '77,  was  the  stock- 
company,  and  it  held  good  names 
and  did  capital  work.  Why,  at  one 
time  or  another  we  had  Fanny  Daven- 
port, Sara  Jewett,  Charles  Coghlan, 
Maurice  Barrymore,  Georgie  and 
John  Drew,  and  James  Lewis.  By 
the  time  "  Pique  "  was  put  on  in  '75 
Fanny  Davenport  was  leading  lady, 
and  in  that  particular  play  we  all  had 
strong  parts.  "  Pique  "  was  not  an 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

adaptation,  but  an  entirely  original 
work  by  Mr.  Daly,  and  it  ran  two 
hundred  nights,  a  wonderful  run 
then,  and  a  good  run  at  any  time. 
People  forget  sometimes  that  Mr. 
Daly  was  a  writer  of  plays,  as  well 
as  an  adapter  and  manager.  He 
needed  the  barest  outline  on  which  to 
build  a  play  ;  something  he  had  seen 
in  a  book  or  read  in  a  newspaper 
would  give  him  the  idea,  and  he 
would  fill  it  in,  and  work  it  out  with 
parts  to  suit  us  all. 

It  was  when  "  Pique  "  was  nearing 
the  close  of  its  run  that  trouble  began 
to  break  out  at  the  second  Fifth  Ave- 
nue Theatre,  although  it  took  a  year 
or  more  to  bring  it  to  a  head.  There 
is  no  use  in  reviewing  quarrels  at  this 
late  date,  but  I  have  always  felt  that 
152 


"  /fyw<?  "  at  the  Fifth  dvenue  Theatre 

From   a  photograph  by  Sarony,  New    Tork.      In   the  collection  of  Evert  Jansen 
Wendell,  Ei<j. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

the  people  "  behind "  the  theatre 
thought  that  they  could  get  on  just 
as  well  without  Mr.  Daly's  manage- 
ment. I  know  that  they  treated  him 
badly,  and  he  lost  money,  and  things 
were  very  much  out  of  joint  for  a 
time.  Sides  were  taken,  of  course, 
and  the  company  was  broken  up. 
Lewis  left,  after  a  battle  royal  with 
the  "  Governor,"  and  only  those  were 
retained  who  were  necessary  to  sup- 
port Miss  Davenport  in  a  starring 
tour,  Barrymore  and  Drew  being  the 
principal  ones.  There  was  really  no 
room  for  me  in  that  work,  but  Mr. 
Daly  said  I  was  to  "go  along"  until 
I  made  some  other  engagement.  At 
that  time  there  were  only  two  other 
big  stock-companies  in  New  York, 
the  Union  Square  under  Mr.  Palmer, 

'55 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
and  Wallack's  old  company.  Mr. 
Daly  talked  over  my  going  to  one 
or  the  other  quite  frankly,  but  con- 
fessed he  would  prefer  my  joining 
Wallack,  as  Palmer  had  already  suc- 
ceeded in  getting  several  of  his  old 
company  away.  Indeed,  Miss  Mor- 
ant,  who  had  left  Daly's  some  time 
before  and  was  at  this  time  with  Mr. 
Palmer,  got  into  the  way  of  coming 
to  take  me  for  long  drives,  when  the 
conversation  used  generally  to  turn 
toward  the  advantage  of  being  at  the 
Union  Square  Theatre. 

As  it  happened,  I  went  there  final- 
ly, but  the  reason  was  a  purely  per- 
sonal one.  My  boy  was  failing 
steadily  by  this  time,  and  I  felt  that 
travelling  about  the  country  would 
hasten  his  death,  and  seized  any  op- 
156 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

portunity  to  get  back  and  be  settled 
in  New  York.  So  I,  too,  left  Mr. 
Daly  under  a  cloud  of  misunderstand- 
ing, for  it  was  during  one  of  his  tem- 
porary absences  that  the  letter  from 
Mr.  Palmer  came,  and  I  had  no 
chance  to  explain  to  the  "  Governor  " 
my  private  reasons  for  hurrying  away 
in  what  looked  like  a  heartless  fashion. 
He  told  me  long  afterward  that  it 
was  not  until  he  saw  my  boy's  death 
in  the  paper,  that  he  understood  what 
seemed  to  be  my  desire  to  get  quit 
of  his  own  sinking  ship.  He  went 
abroad  after  this,  and  for  a  time  we 
neither  saw  him  nor  heard  from  him. 
In  the  meanwhile  I  was  doing  the 
Chanoinesse,  in  "  A  Celebrated  Case," 
at  Palmer's  Theatre.  It  was  a  favor- 
ite part  of  mine,  and  it  was  a  favorite 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

with  the  public  too,  but  for  many 
reasons  I  was  never  really  at  home  at 
the  Union  Square,  and  I  shortly  re- 
joined Mr.  Lewis,  who  was  playing 
under  Mr.  Abbey's  management. 
Agnes  Booth  was  in  that  company 
too,  and  we  toured  the  country. 
Once,  when  we  were  in  some  little 
town  near  New  York,  we  heard  that 
Mr.  Daly  had  returned,  had  taken 
the  old  Olympic — my  first  New 
York  Theatre — and  was  to  open  it 
with  r Assommoir.  I  do  not  remem- 
ber whether  it  was  a  version  of  his 
own  or  the  English  version,  "  Drink," 
in  which  Charles  Warner  made  his 
big  hit.  I  wanted  very  much  to  see 
Mr.  Daly,  but  was  in  a  quandary 
about  it.  If  his  play  were  a  success, 
he  could  not  help  feeling  that  we 
158 


Miss  Fanny  Davenport 

From  a  photograph  by  C.  D.  Fredricks  &  Co., 
Neiu  Tori.  In  the  collection  of  Evert  Janscn 
Wendell,  Elf. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

were  willing  enough  to  gather  around 
him  as  soon  as  his  foot  was  on  the 
ladder  again ;  if  it  were  a  failure,  he 
might  feel  that  we  were  triumphing 
over  him  a  little.  I  thought  it  over 
a  good  deal,  and  it  all  resolved  itself 
into  one  thing — I  simply  was  sure 
that  I  wanted  to  see  the  "  Governor  " 
again,  play  or  no  play.  So  I  man- 
aged to  run  up  to  town  and  get  to  the 
Olympic  while  he  was  still  rehearsing 
his  piece.  As  I  went  in  by  the  box- 
office  I  saw  him  standing  well  down 
the  corridor.  When  he  saw  me  he 
came  forward  with  both  hands  out 
and  real  pleasure  in  his  face.  We 
had  a  good  long  talk,  and  he  begged 
me  to  run  in  and  see  him  whenever  I 
could  get  to  New  York,  for  he  had 
many  things  to  say  to  me.  L* As- 

161 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

sommoir  was  no  great  success,  and  the 
Olympic  was  given  up,  and  the 
theatre  which,  I  am  glad  to  say,  still 
bears  Mr.  Daly's  name  was  built. 
Mr.  Daly  wanted  me  to  go  back  to 
him,  but  for  the  time  I  was  under 
contract  to  Mr.  Abbey.  However, 
even  we  of  the  company  could  see 
that  things  were  not  going  well  with 
our  manager,  and  that  a  break-up 
was  not  far  ahead.  And  before  long 
I  was  free  to  sign  with  Mr.  Daly. 

I  was  anxious  to  have  "  Jimmie  " 
Lewis  back  in  the  company,  too,  and 
sounded  the  "Governor"  about  it. 
"  Well,  bring  him  in  to  see  me  some 
day,"  Mr.  Daly  said;  "  I  fancy  we 
can  arrange  all  that.  I  got  rid  of  a 
lot  of  hard  feeling  and  bad  blood  in 
crossing  that  ocean."  So  Lewis  and 

16* 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

I  came  into  the  orchestra  chairs  one 
day  when  Mr.  Daly  was  superintend- 
ing a  rehearsal.  He  came  over  and 
shook  hands,  quietly  and  pleasantly, 
just  as  if  there  had  never  been  any 
quarrel,  and  everything  was  arranged 
beautifully.  And  then,  oddly  enough, 
Lewis  made  a  great  fuss  over  the  very 
first  part  that  was  given  him.  In 
"  Our  First  Families "  it  was. 
"  There,"  he  said,  his  face  all  twisted 
up  with  half-laughing  disgust  with 
himself,  "  you  see  how  it  is.  I  can't 
help  it.  I'm  a  born  kicker,  and  I 
shall  always  be  a  kicker." 

With  the  opening  of  the  new  thea- 
tre came  the  succession  of  successful 
plays,  adaptations  from  the  German 
and  Shakespearian  revivals,  that 
spread  over  so  many  years,  and  took 
163 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

us  from  New  York  to  England, 
Germany,  and  France  and  back  again. 
John  Drew  had  rejoined  the  com- 
pany, and  Ada  Rehan  had  come  to 
Mr.  Daly,  from  Albany  I  think. 
But  it  matters  very  little  just  where 
she  had  come  from  ;  what  is  import- 
ant is  that  she  had  had,  even  at  that 
early  age,  the  good,  old-fashioned 
training  in  general  work.  I  know 
that  at  one  time  she  had  been  with 
Mrs.  John  Drew  in  Philadelphia,  and 
anyone  who  had  had  that  experience 
was  the  better  for  it.  With  such  prep- 
aration Miss  Rehan  was  as  ready  to 
take  up  the  work  that  fell  to  her 
under  Mr.  Daly's  management  as' 
John  Drew  was  to  undertake  his. 
Mr.  Lewis  and  I  were  old  "  play  "- 
mates,  and  so  we  four — "  The  Big 
164 


Miss  Fanny  Davenport 

From  a  photograph   by  Sarony,    New    York.      la   the 
collection  of  Mrs.  Gilbert. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

Four"  someone  has  called  us — grew 
to  understand  one  another  thor- 
oughly, and  our  working  together 
was  not  only  a  pleasure  to  our  audi- 
ences, but  a  real  delight  to  us. 

The  first  of  the  four  to  go  was 
John  Drew,  and  although  his  going 
takes  me  rather  far  forward  in  my 
story,  it  had  best  be  told  here.  No 
one  can  blame  a  man  for  making  his 
fortune  in  his  own  way  in  this  work- 
aday world  of  ours.  Wiseacres  and 
prophets  shook  their  heads  and  said: 
"  Drew  cannot  live  without  Daly,  and 
Daly  can  get  on  very  well  without 
Drew ;"  and  some  said  just  the  op- 
posite. As  it  proved,  both  sets  of 
prophets  were  wrong.  Although  Mr. 
Drew  was  sadly  missed  in  our  com- 
pany, his  place  was  filled,  and  well 
167 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
filled ;  and  all  of  us  who  cared  for 
him  have  rejoiced  in  his  success  and 
prosperity  as  a  star.  But  at  the  time  of 
his  leaving  we  were  sorry  to  have  him 
go,  and  Mr.  Daly  was  very  sore 
about  it,  did  not  like  it,  and  showed 
that  he  did  not.  During  Mr.  Drew's 
last  year  with  us  his  position  was  none 
too  comfortable,  and  he  needed  all 
his  tact  to  carry  him  through.  We 
played  our  regular  New  York  season, 
then  toured  the  country,  and  then 
went  abroad.  All  over  this  country 
the  word  had  got  about  that  that  was 
to  be  Mr.  Drew's  last  season  with 
the  company,  and  of  course  every- 
body wanted  to  see  him ;  and  they 
did  their  best  to  call  him  before  the 
curtain.  But  Mr.  Daly  would  never 
let  him  take  a  call  alone ;  he  would 

1 68 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

rather  have  the  entire  company 
"out."  So  it  went  on,  until  it  came  to 
our  last  day  on  this  side,  a  Saturday  in 
San  Francisco.  For  the  matinee  a 
play  was  given  in  which  Miss  Rehan 
had  a  strong  role,  and  immediately 
after  that  performance  she  and  Mr. 
Daly  took  train  for  New  York,  leav- 
ing us  to  do  some  piece  in  the  even- 
ing that  would  do  very  well  without 
Miss  Rehan.  The  idea  was  that,  by 
leaving  those  few  hours  earlier,  they 
would  catch  a  steamer  that  would  give 
them  a  week  in  London  before  the 
rest  of  the  company  would  arrive. 
The  audience  knew  that  it  was  John 
Drew's  last  night,  and  the  people 
simply  let  themselves  go  in  their  de- 
termination to  show  him  their  appre- 
ciation. After  the  play  was  over  the 
169 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

usual  number  of  calls  was  answered 
by  all  the  principal  players  together, 
and  then  we  went  to  our  dressing- 
rooms.  But  the  applause  went  on, 
and  it  was  evident  that  it  was  Drew 
they  wanted.  The  difficulty  was  to 
get  someone  to  go  on  with  him,  for 
no  one  dreamed  of  disobeying  the 
unspoken  rule  of  the  absent  "  Gov- 
ernor." The  leading  lady  sent  word 
that  she  was  not  dressed,  and  Mr. 
Dorney,  the  acting  manager,  came  to 
me.  "  What  shall  I  do  ?"  he  said.  I 
had  my  bodice  half  unbuttoned,  but  I 
fastened  it  up  in  a  hurry.  "  Where  is 
he?"  I  asked,  "I'll  go  with  him;" 
and  I  started  out  for  the  stage.  Drew 
was  standing  there,  waiting  to  take  me 
on.  Then  it  came  over  me  that  it  was 
his  call,  that  he  had  earned  it,  and 
170 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

should  have  it,  whatever  happened. 
So  I  would  not  let  him  take  me  on, 
but  I  took  him  well  into  the  middle 
of  the  stage.  Then  I  patted  his  arm, 
looked  up  and  nodded  in  his  face,  and 
left  him  there  to  make  his  acknowl- 
edgments alone.  He  understood,  but 
he  never  said  a  word  about  it.  Only, 
when  he  passed  me  in  the  wings,  he 
stooped  and  kissed  me.  "  God  bless 
you,  Grandma  !"  he  whispered. 

I  suppose  everybody  has  kept  the 
"stage  waiting"  at  one  time  or 
another.  I  can  remember  doing  it 
twice.  The  first  time  was  in  the 
little  Fifth  Avenue  Theatre  on 
Twenty-fourth  Street.  The  Theatre 
belonged  to  Jay  Gould  and  "  Jim  " 
Fisk,  and  Mr.  Daly  was  only  lessee. 
In  spite  of  the  "  Governor's  "  rules, 
171 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
Mr.  Fisk  would  come  into  the 
green-room  once  in  a  while,  and  sit 
there  chatting  "with  one  or  another  of 
us.  So  we  all  knew  him  in  a  way, 
and  when  the  news  of  his  murder 
reached  us  we  were  terribly  upset. 
We  heard  it  first  just  as  the  play  was 
beginning,  and  all  through  the  even- 
ing we  were  eager  for  .any  scrap  of  in- 
formation. I  had  received  my  "  call  " 
in  good  time,  and  was  on  my  way  to 
the  stage,  when  someone  said  some- 
thing about  Fisk,  and  I  stopped  de- 
liberately to  listen,  forgetting  every- 
thing else  for  the  moment.  I  had 
not  the  slightest  excuse  for  being  late 
for  my  entrance,  and  there  was  noth- 
ing to  do  but  fine  me  or  forgive  me. 
Mr.  Daly  chose  to  forgive — although 
he  was  usually  severe  in  dealing  out 
172 


Mrs.    Gilbert 


From  a  photograph  by  Pirou,  Paris.      In  the  collection 
of  Evert  Jamen  Wendell,  Esq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

fines — for    he    thought   the   circum- 
stances unusual. 

The  second  experience  was  alto- 
gether comic.  It  happened  in  Phila- 
delphia, where  we  were  playing 
"  Dollars  and  Sense  "  in  our  opening 
engagement  in  this  country  after  our 
return  from  a  trip  abroad.  Mr.  Daly 
always  made  very  close  connections, 
and  this  time  we  were  due  to  get  into 
New  York  on  Sunday,  and  play  in 
Philadelphia  on  Monday  night.  As 
it  happened,  we  were  late  in  getting 
in,  and  had  to  anchor  off  Coney 
Island  all  night.  What  with  Sunday 
celebrations  and  rockets  down  there, 
and  the  excitement  that  always  comes 
with  getting  home,  we  didn't  sleep 
much  !  We  got  up  to  our  dock  in 
the  morning,  and  I  had  just  time  to 
175 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
run  up  to  my  home,  get  a  bit  of 
lunch,  and  catch  the  one-o'clock  train 
to  Philadelphia.  By  that  time  I  was 
rather  tired  and  thoroughly  miserable, 
for  I  sometimes  get  the  worst  of  my 
sea-sickness  after  I  am  on  shore. 
However,  the  first  act  of  the  play 
went  all  right,  and  as  I  did  not  have 
to  go  on  until  the  end  of  the  second 
act,  and  had  no  change  to  make  in 
my  costume,  I  thought  I  would  rest  a 
bit.  I  rolled  up  the  shawl  I  wore  in 
the  character  for  a  pillow,  took  off 
my  bonnet,  slipped  my  most  tired 
foot  out  of  its  shoe,  and  lay  down  on 
the  floor  of  my  dressing-room.  I  had 
no  idea,  whatever,  of  going  to  sleep. 
The  first  thing  I  knew  was  a  great 
buzzing,  then  I  sat  up  with  a  start. 
My  door  was  full  of  faces,  the 
176 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

"  Governor's "  looming  up  above 
them  all,  and  all  of  them  rather  fright- 
ened. They  didn't  know  whether  I 
was  ill,  or  had  fainted,  or  what  was 
the  matter.  "The  stage  is  waiting," 
said  Mr.  Daly.  The  way  I  got  on 
my  loose  shoe  and  reached  for  my 
bonnet  soon  satisfied  them  that  /was 
all  right.  My  dressing-room  was 
close  to  the  stage,  and  I  -rushed  on 
the  nearest  side,  the  wrong  side,  of 
course.  There  was  poor  Lewis  mak- 
ing talk  to  cover  my  delay,  but  he 
had  unconsciously  become  so  English 
that  he  was  saying  :  "  I  suppose  my 
wife  is  quarreling  with  the  cabby  over 
a  sixpence."  It  was  my  business  to 
run  up  to  him  and  throw  my  arms 
around  his  neck.  Coming  in  on  the 
wrong  side,  of  course  I  seized  him 
177 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

from  behind.  He  choked  in  his  sur- 
prise, and  even  the  audience  had  to 
see  that  that  comic  effect  was  unre- 
hearsed and  all  my  fault ;  but  it 
couldn't  see  the  scene  that  had  taken 
place  in  my  dressing-room,  and  that 
is  one  I  shall  never  forget.  Our 
playing  in  Philadelphia  at  that  time 
had  especial  point,  for  we  had  given 
our  farewell  performance  there  before 
sailing.  I  forget  the  play,  but  it  was 
something  in  which  I  had  no  part. 
Still  I  had  to  be  at  the  theatre,  for  it 
was  from  there  that  we  were  all  to 
start.  So  I  went  down  in  my  bonnet 
and  wrap  with  my  travelling  bag 
ready  to  take  the  midnight  train  to 
New  York  with  the  rest.  Mr.  Daly 
had  asked  me  to  be  on  hand,  and  had 
arranged  a  little  scene  that  he  thought 
178 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

would  prove  bright  and  amusing. 
When  the  piece  was  over  the  usual 
calls  were  received  and  answered. 
Finally  they  got  Mr.  Daly  just  by 
himself,  and  began  to  cry,  "  Speech, 
speech."  Mr.  Daly  shook  his  head 
— a  speech  was  something  he  rarely 
made.  Then  he  said  :  "  I  have  got 
someone  here  who  can  do  it  much 
better,"  and  fetched  me  out,  travel- 
ling-bag and  all.  I  bowed  to  the 
audience,  became  confused  and  be- 
wildered, and  at  last  turned  to  him. 

"  What  shall  I  say  ?  " 

He  leaned  over  and  whispered 
something  to  me  and  I  repeated  it 
aloud,  got  more  confused,  hesitated, 
and  turned  to  him  again.  Again  he 
whispered,  and  I  repeated.  I  have  no 
recollection  now  of  the  exact  words, 
179 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

but  I  know  they  ended  with  a  hope 
that  they  would  not  forget  us,  for  we 
should  never  forget  them.  The  house 
liked  it,  and  even  Miss  Rehan,  Mr. 
Drew,  and  the  rest  never  dreamed 
that  our  tiny  comedy  was  not  im- 
promptu. It  was  like  the  "  Gover- 
nor" to  give  me  a  chance  to  say 
good-by  to  good  friends. 

It  was  he  who  first  called  me 
"  Grandma."  Sometimes  when  he 
felt  especially  friendly  he  would  say 
"  Gran."  Sometimes,  too,  I  was 
"  Nan,"  for  he  had  a  great  liking  for 
my  Christian  name.  "  Come  along, 
Anne  Hartley,"  he  would  say,  or 
when  he  was  registering  at  an  hotel  : 
"  I  want  Anne  Hartley  Gilbert  writ- 
ten just  here,  it  will  look  so  well ! " 
And  of  course  I  would  write  it. 
1 80 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
One  of  the  last  times  we  were  all 
together  in  Brooklyn,  Mr.  Daly  took 
Miss  Rehan  and  me  to  dinner  be- 
tween the  plays  on  a  matinee  day. 
At  table  I  passed  him  a  visiting  card 
and  asked  him  if  he  had  ever  heard 
of  that  person.  It  was  an  old-old- 
fashioned  thing,  with  a  satin  surface, 
its  edges  so  stained  and  yellow  that 
they  looked  as  if  someone  had  been 
trying  to  paint  a  wreath  about  them. 
On  it,  written  as  if  with  a  silver  point, 
was  "  Anne  Jane  Hartley,"  and  on 
its  back  was  the  address  of  someone 
in  Conduit  Street,  London.  Why  I 
had  kept  it  all  those  years,  I  don't 
know,  but  I  had  found  it  the  very 
morning  of  our  dinner,  when  turning 
over  just  the  few  bits  of  things  I  had 
kept  from  my  girlhood,  and  had  put  it 

181 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

in  my  purse,  as  a  surprise  for  the 
"  Governor,"  knowing  that  he  liked 
everything  that  was  old,  even  my  old 
name.  And,  indeed,  he  fairly  chuc- 
kled over  it. 


'James   Lewis  and   'John   Dreiv  in  "Pique  " 

From  a  photograph  by  Sarony,  Neiu   York.      In  the  collection  of  E-vert  jfansen 
Wendell,  Esq. 


Ill 

I    DON'T     know    what    first    in- 
duced   Mr.   Daly   to  take    his 
company  to  Europe.   I  dare  say 
that  it  was  a  sort  of  tit-for-tat  policy. 
English    companies    came     to    Ne.w 
York,  why  should   not  a   New  York 
company  go  to  England  ?      Anyway, 
we    went,  first   to   Mr.  Toole's  little 
theatre,  just  off  the  Strand,  later  to 
the  Globe,  then  to  the  Lyceum,  and 
finally  to  our  own  theatre  in  Leicester 
Square.      It  has  always  been  a  mys- 
tery to  me  how  even  the  managers 
185 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

can  tell  what  will  "  take "  on  the 
other  side  of  the  ocean,  what  will 
stand  the  test  of  transplantation.  In- 
deed, mistakes  are  constantly  being 
made  in  these  forecasts  and  reckon- 
ings, and  English  successes  are  fail- 
ures in  America,  and  New  York  plays 
are  wholly  misunderstood  in  London. 
In  his  first  London  venture  Mr.  Daly 
had  the  late  Mr.  William  Terris  as 
his  adviser,  and  doubtless  much  of 
his  advice  was  excellent,  but  it  was 
comically  wrong  in  one  particular. 
Mr.  Terris  seriously  counselled  that 
Miss  May  Irwin,  who  was  in  our  com- 
pany then,  should  not  be  taken  to 
England.  "  Her  kind  of  fun  is  pecu- 
liarly American,  and  would  not  be 
understood  over  there,"  was  his  opin- 
ion. Mr.  Daly  thought  differently, 

186 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

and  he  carried  his  point,  and  also 
carried  Miss  Irwin  to  London,  where 
she  made  a  hit  at  once,  just  as  she  did 
in  France  and  Germany.  Miss  Irwin's 
fun  is  neither  American  nor  English, 
but  universal.  She  has  the  real  spirit 
of  comedy  in  her,  something  of  the 
rollicking  mischief  that  always  lived 
in  Mrs.  John  Wood.  Her  silences 
were  as  funny  as  her  speeches,  and  to 
see  her  as  the  respectful,  but  too- 
knowing  maid,  listening  to  Lewis  in 
his  favorite  character  of  humbugging 
husband,  was  a  treat  that  foreign  aud- 
iences appreciated  at  first  sight. 

The  English  audiences  were  always 
good  to  us,  though  their  critics  were 
sometimes  severe  on  our  plays,  and 
the  country  at  large  gasped  at  the 
liberties  that  Mr.  Daly  took  with 
187 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
Shakespeare.  It  was  bad  enough  that 
a  "  foreign,"  especially  an  American, 
company  should  come  to  England, 
and  play  Shakespeare  without  saying 
"  by  your  leave  "  ;  but  that  an  Amer- 
ican manager  should  "  adapt  "  Shake- 
speare, and  so  render  his  comic  roles 
that  they  were  actually  funny,  was 
almost  beyond  belief.  I  have  seen  an 
audience  there  convulsed  with  laughter 
over  Catherine  Lewis  and  James 
Lewis  in  "  Twelfth  Night,"  and  then 
suddenly  pull  itself  together  as  if 
ashamed  to  be  caught  finding  amuse- 
ment in  an  English  classic  ! 

Our  London  seasons  became  a 
regular  and  a  very  pleasant  portion  of 
our  working  year,  but  our  playing  in 
Germany  and  France  was  much  more 
for  the  "  name  of  doing  it,"  although 

188 


James  Lewis 

From  an  early  photograph  by  H.  G.  Smith,  Boston. 
In  the  collection  of  Evert  jf arisen  Wendell,  Esq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

in  both  countries  we  were  well  receiv- 
ed on  our  first  visit,  and  always  made 
welcome  on  our  returns,  for  return  we 
did,  several  times.  Our  first  visit  to 
the  Continent  was  rather  a  daring 
thing,  for  it  was  not  so  long  after  the 
Franco-Prussian  war  but  that  hard 
feeling  was  everywhere.  Then  we 
chose  to  go  to  Germany  first,  and 
from  there  to  France.  I  know  the 
French  were  still  so  bitter  that  they 
would  not  accept  German  gold — ex- 
cept when  you  had  nothing  else  to  give 
them  in  the  way  of  tips,  and  then 
they  would  not  give  you  any  change  ! 
Still,  Mr.  Daly  presented  adaptations 
from  the  German  in  Paris,  and  they 
were  better  received  there  even  than 
they  had  been  in  Germany  itself. 
But  the — well,  there  is  really  no 
191 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

other  word  for  it — the  "cheekiest" 
thing  he  ever  did  was  to  give  his  ver- 
sion of  "  Les  Surprises  du  Divorce" 
which  he  called  "  The  Lottery  of 
Love,"  on  our  last  night  in  Paris,  at 
the  very  theatre  where  it  had  been 
originally  brought  out  by  a  French 
company,  and  an  uncommonly  good 
company,  too.  Mr.  Daly  had  modi- 
fied the  play  for  production  in  Amer- 
ica, many  of  the  changes  being  made 
in  my  part — that  of  a  fussy,  interfer- 
ing mother  who  is  given  to  marrying 
her  daughter  to  all  the  men  in  the  cast, 
one  after  the  other,  and  then  getting 
her  divorced  at  once  for  one  reason 
or  another.  One  of  the  suitors,  an 
ardent  amateur  photographer,  in  his 
attempt  to  separate  the  daughter  from 
her  latest  husband,  flatters  the  old 
192 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

lady  into  posing  for  a  professional 
picture,  in  order  to  compromise  her 
with  her  latest  son-in-law.  In  the 
original  play,  the  mother  had  been  a 
ballet-dancer,  and  comes  in  to  pose 
for  her  portrait  in  full  modern  ballet 
costume.  Mrs.  John  Wood  adopted 
this  costume,  and  the  little  dance  that 
went  with  it  in  the  English  version 
she  used  in  London,  and  of  course  it 
was  very  funny. 

But  Mr.  Daly  said  he  would  not 
dream  of  asking  me  to  do  that,  and 
he  hit  upon  the  happy  idea  of  making 
me  a  woman's  rights  crank — that 
movement  was  then  in  full  swing — 
coming  on  in  regulation  "bloomers" 
and  a  little  round  hat.  Then  he  intro- 
duced an  old  gentleman  who  had  had 
us  all  on  his  yacht  for  a  cruise,  who, 
193 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

seeing  me  in  this  rig,  made  some  refer- 
ence to  a  horn-pipe,  that  was  supposed 
to  start  me  off  in  that  dance,  when 
John  Drew,  as  the  latest  son-in-law, 
rushed  in  aghast  and  ran  me  off  at  the 
wings.  And  we  did  all  this  in  Paris,  for 
all  my  poor  French  dresser  was  very 
much  troubled  to  find  no  ballet  cos- 
tume in  my  wardrobe,  and  did  not  know 
what  to  do  with  the  "  bloomers." 
Many  of  the  old  French  company  of 
the  house  were  buzzing  about  behind 
the  scenes,  full  of  curiosity  and 
amusement,  and  the  audience  was 
puzzled  by  the  changes  in  the  play  ; 
but  the  genuine  dash  and  fun  of  the 
thing  carried  the  points  home  to  them 
and  the  final  curtain  came  down  to  a 
good  round  of  applause.  For  myself, 
I  doubt  if  I  ever  did  harder  work,  and 
194 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

I  think  we  were  all  glad  that  that 
night  ended  our  French  engagement. 
Yet  we  were  pleased  with  ourselves, 
and  proud  of  the  "  Governor,"  that 
he  had  carried  his  coals  to  Newcastle 
in  such  successful  fashion. 

We  found  the  German  and  French 
audiences  very  much  like  the  Eng- 
lish, after  all.  A  synopsis  of  the  play 
was  always  printed  on  the  pro- 
grammes, just  as  it  would  be  for  a 
foreign  play  given  in  this  country, 
and,  except  for  some  minor  points, 
nothing  seemed  to  escape  them.  As 
for  us,  we  went  on  just  the  same  as 
if  we  were  at  home  in  our  New  York 
house.  Mr.  Daly  always  carried 
along  his  entire  company,  and  every 
detail  of  our  travelling  was  thorough- 
ly worked  out,  from  our  time-tables 

'95 


The  Stape  Reminiscences  of 
down   to   the  amount  of  luggage  we 
were  allowed  apiece.     All  we  had  to 
do  was  to  follow  directions,  and  ask 
no  questions. 

To  be  sure,  following  directions, 
even  in  one's  own  country,  where  lan- 
guage and  customs  help  instead  of 
hinder,  sometimes  involves  a  good 
deal  of  waiting  about  and  not  a  little 
anxiety.  One  week  of  my  profes- 
sional life  stands  out  very  distinctly 
because  of  the  traveling  I  had  to 
do.  It  was  Christmas  week  a  few 
years  ago,  and  I  spent  the  greater  part 
of  it  chasing  back  and  forth  across 
the  state  of  New  York.  As  it  hap- 
pened, Mr.  Daly  was  giving  certain 
Shakespearian  plays  in  the  city, 
and  so  part  of  the  company  would 
have  been  idle  if  he  had  not  sent  them 
196 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

on  a  special  little  tour  up  the  state.  I 
was  among  those  to  go,  and  we  were 
to  give  one  performance  in  New- 
burgh,  two  each  in  Syracuse  and 
Rochester,  and  so  on.  Just  before 
we  were  to  leave,  I  was  at  the  theatre, 
and  happened  to  be  standing  near  the 
"  Governor." 

"  I  see  you're  to  give  '  The  Shrew  ' 
for  the  Wednesday  matinee,"  I  said, 
"  and  who  is  to  do  Curtis  ?  " 

He  just  looked  at  me,  without  a 
word.  I  suspect  that  the  possibility 
of  his  needing  me  in  New  York  had 
not  entered  his  mind,  but  it  wasn't 
his  way  to  say  so,  or  to  say  what  he 
was  going  to  do  about  it,  until  he  had 
had  time  to  think  it  all  out. 

"And  Governor,"  I  added,"!  shall 
not  be  here  for  New  Year's  Eve!  " 

'97 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
For  years  the  older  members  of 
the  company  had  seen  "  the  Old  Year 
out  and  the  New  Year  in  "  together, 
gathering  in  the  Peg  Woffington  room 
that  Mr.  Daly  had  fitted  up  for  just 
that  sort  of  celebration.  Now  this 
particular  year  was  to  go  out  on  a 
Friday,  and  I  was  to  be  playing  in 
Rochester  in  "  Number  Nine."  This 
disturbed  him,  and  he  showed  it,  but 
in  the  hurry  of  getting  us  all  off 
he  could  only  say :  "  We  must 
arrange  it  somehow." 

Well,  we  played  our  one  night  in 
Newburgh,  and  got  to  Syracuse  on 
the  Tuesday.  Then  word  came  that 
I  was  to  leave  after  the  play  on  Tues- 
day night  and  so  get  to  New  York  for 
the  Wednesday  afternoon  perform- 
ance of  "The  Shrew."  Now,  my 
198 


'James  Lewis  and  Mrs.  Gilbert  in  the  Comedy  of  the 
"  Big  Bonanza  " 

From  a   photograph  by  Sarony,    New    Tort.      In  the  collection  of  Even  Jamtn 
Wendell,  Eiq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

understudy,  Miss  Germon,  had  not 
started  from  New  York  with  us  for 
some  reason  or  other,  and  the  mana- 
ger of  our  little  branch  tour  refused 
to  let  me  go  until  he  was  sure  of 
someone  to  take  my  place.  As  a 
usual  thing  Mr.  Daly  sent  out  a  most 
complete  staff  of  understudies,  and 
took  no  chances  whatever,  but  this 
holiday  time  was  an  exception.  The 
play  was  pushed  through  just  a  little 
on  this  Tuesday  night,  that  I  might 
have  time  to  catch  the  eleven  o'clock 
train,  but  still  no  word  came  from 
Miss  Germon.  The  man  who  had 
come  up  from  the  New  York  office 
that  day  with  our  salaries  could  tell 
us  nothing  of  her.  So  we  all  went 
down  to  the  station,  leaving  a  com- 
plete trail  behind  us  over  which  a  tel- 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

egram  or  telephone  message  could  be 
sent  in  short  order.  The  train  came 
thundering  in.  It  was  a  through  train 
from  somewhere,  and  still  the  only 
decided  one  in  our  group  was  the  man- 
ager, who  would  not  let  me  go.  As 
luck  would  have  it,  something  about 
the  train  broke  down.  They  spent 
nearly  an  hour  patching  it  up,  while 
we  sat  around,  and  just  before  they 
were  ready  to  start  again,  Miss  Ger- 
mon's  telegram  came  and  I  was  free  to 
go  to  New  York.  When  the  curtain 
went  up  on  "  The  Shrew  "  on  Wed- 
nesday afternoon,  I  was  ready  to  do 
Curtis^  although  an  all-night  journey 
isn't  the  best  preparation  even  for  a 
small  part. 

Before    I     started    for    Rochester, 
where  I  was  to  take  part  in  the  Thurs- 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

day  night  performance  of  "  Number 
Nine,"  they  gave  me  the  tickets  which 
were  to  bring  me  back  to  New  York 
in  time  for  the  New  Year's  Eve  gath- 
ering. It  was  all  arranged  ;  I  was  to 
leave  Rochester  at  eight  in  the 
morning,  and  get  into  town  at  eight 
at  night,  but  unfortunately  my  tickets 
were  by  the  "  West  Shore,"  a  line 
the  "  Governor  "  rarely  used,  for  it 
meant  getting  into  New  York  by  way 
of  a  ferry,  with  endless  possibilities  of 
delay.  On  this  particular  Friday 
heavy  storms  along  the  line  made  the 
train  so  late  that  we  did  not  leave 
Rochester  until  eleven.  All  day  long 
we  crawled  down  the  state,  and  I  grew 
more  and  more  nervous.  Leaving  at 
eleven  in  the  morning  meant  getting 
in  at  eleven  at  night  even  with  ordi- 
203 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
nary  speed,  and  we  were  making  no 
speed  at  all.  There  were  very  few 
people  in  the  Pullman,  and  one  kind- 
ly couple  became  greatly  interested  in 
my  plight.  The  gentleman  even  got 
into  the  way  of  going  out  and  stirring 
up  the  engineer  at  every  town  we 
stopped.  Finally,  he  must  have  won 
the  engineer  over  to  our  side,  for  the 
message  came  back  :  "  Tell  the  lady 
not  to  worry;  I'll  get  her  there  in 
time." 

Still  it  was  long  after  eleven  when 
we  reached  the  New  York  side  of  the 
river,  and  we  were  'way  down  town. 
It  was  New  Year's  Eve,  too,  and  the 
crowd  was  beyond  description.  My 
friends  of  the  train  stuck  to  me  man- 
fully, and  we  all  hung  on  to  the  back 
platform  of  something  that  took  us  to 
204 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

the  elevated  railroad  station.  When 
I  got  to  the  theatre, William  Winter's 
son  was  standing  in  the  door  watching 
for  me.  "  You're  in  time,"  he  called 
to  me  as  I  rushed  past.  A  little  far- 
ther on  my  way  up-stairs  I  ran  across 
the  faithful  negro  woman  who  took 
such  good  care  of  us  all,  who  is  now 
with  Miss  Rehan.  "  Oh,  Lizzie  !  " 
I  cried,  and  she  managed  to  get  off 
my  bonnet  almost  without  stopping 
me. 

As  I  burst  into  the  Peg  Woffing- 
ton  room  they  were  all  standing  about 
the  table — Mr.  and  Mrs.  Daly,  the 
Judge,  Miss  Rehan  and  the  rest,  with 
their  watches  in  their  hands. 

"  God  save  all  here  !  "  I  managed  to 
gasp,  before  I  kissed  the  "  Gover- 
nor "  and  dropped  into  the  waiting 
205 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

chair  at  his  side.  They  devoted  some 
of  the  egg-nog  to  reviving  me  before 
drinking  to  the  New  Year. 

To  return  to  our  foreign  experi- 
ences: 

Of  course,  when  in  France  or  Ger- 
many, Mr.  Daly  had  to  have  some- 
one to  interpret  between  him  and  the 
scene-shifters  and  other  workmen 
about  the  theatre,  but,  except  for  that, 
we  went  on  exactly  as  if  we  were  on 
Broadway.  And  by  this  time  the 
management  of  the  company  had  been 
reduced  to  a  very  complete  routine. 
If  there  is  any  one  word  that  can  ex- 
press Mr.  Daly's  system,  it  is  Watch- 
fulness. The  French  saying  that,  to 
insure  success,  "  the  eye  of  the  mas- 
ter "  should  be  everywhere,  could  be 
applied  to  him.  From  whatever 
206 


Mrs.  Gilbert  and  James  Lewis  in  "  7-20-28  " 

From  a  photograph  by  Sarony,  New    York.      In  the  collection  of  Evert 
Jamen  Wendell,  Esq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

source  he  got  his  play,  whether  it 
were  one  of  his  own,  one  of  his  adap- 
tations, Shakespearian  or  otherwise, 
or  an  original  work  of  some  other  man, 
the  first  thing  Mr.  Daly  did  was  to 
read  it  to  the  company.  He  read  very 
well  indeed,  too.  Then  he  gave  out 
the  parts,  and  rehearsals  began.  He 
was  not  a  severe  rehearser,  as  far  as 
long  hours  went.  We  were  usually 
"  called  "  for  eleven  in  the  morning  in 
the  early  days,  but  later,  when  Miss 
Rehan  was  not  so  strong,  and  had  to 
be  spared,  we  would  often  not  be- 
gin until  after  one — after  Mr.  Daly's 
own  lunch — and  then  things  would 
drag  on,  rather.  Often,  of  course, 
rehearsals  would  be  called  for  the  gen- 
eral company  only,  and  then  we  prin- 
cipals would  not  have  to  go. 
209 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
Mr.  Daly  was  very  exacting  in  his 
training  of  the  subordinates,  and 
would  not  tolerate  anyone  standing 
about  as  if  uninterested  in  the  action 
of  the  piece.  I  have  no  wish  to  set 
myself  up  as  a  critic  of  his  methods, 
but  it  sometimes  seemed  to  me  that 
he  had  even  too  much  movement  in 
some  of  his  scenes.  With  us  princi- 
pals he  rarely  interfered  seriously,  let- 
ting us  work  out  our  own  ideas  of  our 
parts,  although  everything  had  to  pass 
his  final  approval  before  it  could  stand, 
and  he  would  cut  out  our  pet  lines  at 
the  last  moment  if  he  saw  fit.  Then, 
too,  he  would  have  sudden  inspira- 
tions. I  remember  once  I  had  an  en- 
trance to  make,  and,  just  as  I  crossed 
the  threshold,  something  pulled  me 
back.  Of  course  I  threw  up  my  hands 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

and  flung  back  my  head,  and  the 
effect  was  comic,  and,  as  it  happened, 
in  keeping  with  the  part.  When  I 
turned  round  to  see  what  had  done  it, 
there  was  the  "  Governor  "  holding  on 
to  my  gown,  and  laughing.  After 
that  he  gave  orders  that  there  should 
always  be  someone  there  to  twitch  me 
backward  for  that  entrance,  and  he 
was  often  there  to  see  that  that  order 
was  properly  carried  out,  too. 

At  rehearsal  Mr.  Daly's  chair  was 
placed  at  one  side  of  the  stage,  its 
back  to  the  house.  There  he  would 
sit,  when  he  was  content  to  sit  at  all, 
and  make  suggestions  and  give  direc- 
tions. But  more  often  he  was  in 
among  us,  telling  us  what  to  do,  and 
showing  us  how  to  do  it.  Once,  I 
remember,  Miss  Irwin,  in  the  charac- 

211 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
ter  of  an  eavesdropping  maid,  had  to 
lean  against  the  corridor  side  of  a  door 
and  then  fall  headlong  into  the  room 
when  the  door  was  suddenly  opened. 
She  did  it  half  heartily,  for  it  is  very 
difficult  to  make  a  spirited  tumble  just 
at  rehearsal,  and  the  "  Governor"  was 
on  his  feet  in  a  moment,  showing  her 
how  it  should  be  done.  "  It  must  be 
like  that,"  he  said,  picking  himself  up 
and  dusting  himself  off.  She  looked 
him  up  and  down — he  was  tall  and 
slender,  you  know — and  answered 
saucily  :  "  I  never  could  reach  so  far ; 
I  haven't  the  length,  you  know." 
"  Then  you  must  do  it  breadthwise," 
he  retorted,  and  she  had  the  good 
sense  and  the  good  fun  to  acknowl- 
edge that  the  joke  was  turned  on  her, 
for  even  then  she  was  very  stout. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

Mr.  Daly  would  permit  no  "  gag- 
ging," and  quite  right  too  !  But  we 
who  worked  together  all  the  time  struck 
sparks  out  of  one  another,  as  it  were. 
And  inspirations  would  come  in  all 
sorts  of  odd  ways.  Still,  I  never 
would  make  a  point,  or  say  a  thing, 
no  matter  how  funny  it  might  be,  un- 
less it  was  in  keeping  with  the  especial 
person  I  was  doing,  something  she, 
not  I,  would  say.  Once,  I  know,  in 
"  A  Woman's  Won't,"  when  we  sat 
down  to  our  table  and  began  with 
our  oyster-broth,  real  broth  it  was, 
and  uncommonly  good  too,  Mr. Lewis 
said,  "  Pass  me  the  crackers."  Now, 
there  were  no  crackers  as  it  happened, 
and  we  were  at  a  loss  for  the  moment. 
I  could  think  of  nothing  better  to  say 
than  the  current  slang  of  the  day : 
215 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
"  They're  in  the  soup."  It  was  funny, 
and  I  could  see  the  "  Governor  "  at 
his  station  in  the  wings,  double  up 
in  his  amusement.  No  crackers  were 
allowed  on  the  table  after  that,  and 
I  was  always  given  a  chance  to  get 
off  my  slang.  Sometimes,  though, 
Mr.  Daly  would  tire  of  these  inter- 
polations, or  would  fancy  that  they 
lost  their  point  and  their  freshness 
with  too  frequent  repetition.  Then  he 
would  stop  them  short. 

Once  towards  the  end,  when  we 
were  rehearsing  "  Cyrano  de  Berger- 
ac,"  I  unconsciously  made  a  contribu- 
tion to  the  "  business."  It  was  in  the 
scene  where  the  two  pages  come  in 
with  Cyrano  to  serenade  Roxane.  I 
was  standing  by  as  the  duenna.  The 
music  was  very  pretty  and  catchy. 
216 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

My  feet  always  answered  to  the  sound 
of  music  anyway  and  this  time,  hav- 
ing nothing  in  particular  to  do,  I 
began  to  "  step  it  out,"  and  was  hav- 
ing a  great  dance  all  to  myself  when 
I  heard  Miss  Rehan  whisper  :  "Gov- 
ernor, look  at  Grandma!  "  He  look- 
ed and  nodded.  Of  course  the  Cyrano 
(Mr.  Richman)  looked  too,  and  that 
brought  me  back  to  my  part  as  staid 
and  proper  as  a  duenna  should  be, 
making  a  pretty  finish  to  the  scene. 
Mr.  Daly  made  us  rehearse  it  thor- 
oughly, and  it  became  part  of  the 
performance.  He  used  to  say  I  need 
never  be  out  of  the  cast,  for  I  could 
always  dance,  even  if  I  had  no  lines  to 
say.  Once  he  introduced  a  Sir  Roger  de 
Coverley,  just  to  bring  me  on.  It  was 
then  that  I  teased  my  friends,  telling 
217 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
them  that  I  had  been  promoted  to  the 
front  row  of  the  ballet,  and  must  put  all 
the  photographs  of  my  men  friends 
out  of  my  rooms  when  their  wives 
called,  so  as  not  to  compromise  them. 

Mr.  Daly  would  work  with  the 
rest  of  us,  and  often  more  than  the 
rest  of  us.  I  have  seen  him  help  shift 
a  scene,  and  then  come  down  to  the 
front  again  with  his  hands  dirty,  and 
his  face  dirty  too,  sometimes,  and  go 
on  with  his  work  without  a  thought 
of  himself.  Then  the  day  would  come 
when  his  chair  would  disappear  from 
its  usual  place,  and  we  knew  we  were 
in  for  our  hardest  trial,  for  "  the 
f  Governor '  is  out  in  front."  The 
front  of  the  house  would  be  all 
dark,  and  we  could  never  see  him,  but 
we  could  hear  his  voice — now  from 
218 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

the  orchestra  chairs,  now  from  the 
gallery — whenever  anything  did  not 
go  quite  right.  I  never  attempted  to 
mark  down  any  directions  on  my  part 
until  after  Mr.  Daly  had  seen  a  re- 
hearsal "  from  the  front."  For  there 
is  no  question  but  that  the  "  front  of 
the  house  "  —the  audience,  in  other 
words — gets  a  point  of  view  and  a 
grasp  of  the  stage  picture  that  the 
actors,  and  even  the  stage  manager 
himself,  can  never  get  from  the  other 
side  of  the  footlights. 

On  the  first  night  of  every  play, 
Mr.  Daly  always  prompted  the  piece 
himself,  standing  by  the  prompter  and 
holding  the  book.  This  led  to  an 
amusing  incident  one  night.  There 
was  a  line  to  be  spoken  off  the  stage, 
and  knowing  how  important  it  was 
219 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
that  it  should  be  done  just  right,  Mr. 
Daly  determined  to  say  it  himself,  but 
he  miscalculated  distances,  or  some- 
thing of  the  kind,  for  when  the  line 
was  due,  he  wasn't  in  the  right  place 
to  say  it.  The  prompter  could  do 
nothing,  for  Mr.  Daly  had  the  book, 
and  we  who  were  about  dared  not 
prompt  him.  Of  course  the  line  was 
given  eventually,  but  it  hung  fire  in  a 
way  that  would  have  made  trouble  if 
anyone  but  the  "  Governor  "  had  been 
responsible ! 

Even  after  the  rehearsals  and  the 
first  night  were  over,  even  when  the 
play  was  before  the  public,  Mr.  Daly 
was  always  on  the  watch.  If  anything 
went  wrong,  and  some  of  us  said: 
"  Thank  fortune  the  '  Governor ' 
didn't  see  that,"  there  he  was  at  one's 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

elbow.  But  often  at  morning  re- 
hearsal he  would  make  some  com- 
ment or  criticism  on  the  performance 
of  the  night  before  that  would  mystify 
us  all,  for  none  of  us  had  seen  him 
anywhere.  Finally,  I  asked  him  one 
day  :  "  Look  here,  '  Governor,' 
where  did  you  use  to  be,  that  you 
saw  everything  we  did  ?  " 

"  If  you  really  want  to  know,"  he 
answered,  "I  was  up  on  the  paint- 
screen."  There  he  had  been  perched 
up  among  the  flies,  on  the  great  rack 
that  the  scene-painters  use  for  their 
work,  with  his  head  over  the  edge, 
watching  every  action  on  his  stage, 
night  after  night.  Of  course  that 
was  in  his  early  days.  Later,  when 
he  had  his  company  thoroughly  train- 
ed, and  had  made  his  reputation  as  a 


The  StaV     Reminiscences  of 

manager,  IVi"  Daly  was  content  to 
watch  from  his  box.  And  either  he 
or  Mrs.  Daly  was  always  there.  She 
was  a  Mi  Duff,  daughter  of  the 
famous  ma*  .,  -u  she  knew  the 
stage  and  st.  ^e  life  thoroughly,  from 
Mr.  Daly's  own  point  of  view.  She 
was  a  good  wife  to  him  and  a  great 
helper  in  every  way.  She  knew  her 
husband's  business  thoroughly,  and 
never  told  a  word  of  it,  and  that 
is  saying  a  great  deal,  for  curious 
people  would  often  ask  her  ques- 
tions about  affairs  when  they 
would  not  dare  ask  her  husband. 
And  she  was  always  pleasant  and 
merry  with  him  and  with  everybody 
else.  They  say  he  used  to  come 
home  at  night  and  fling  himself  down 
on  the  sofa,  wholly  worn  out  with 


Mrs. 

the  day's  hard  work,  a»d  say  :  "  Tell 
me  a  funny  story,  May,  and  take  my 
mind  off  all  this."  And  she  always 
had  the  story  ready. 

A  lovely  trai,.  Daly's  char- 

acter was  his  tendernes4  and  thought 
of  children.  I  never  K.iew  him  to 
pass  a  little  newsboy  on  the  street 
without  buying  a  paper,  and  he  al- 
ways took  the  paper  with  a  look  in 
his  eyes  as  much  as  to  say  :  "  We 
must  help  the  boys  to  get  a  living." 
A  beautiful  trait,  not  giving  as  charity 
but  buying  what  the  boy  had  to  sell. 

People  may  say  that  Mr.  Daly's 
place  can  be  easily  filled,  that  his  in- 
fluence will  not  last,  and  all  that.  But 
the  longer  we  are  without  him,  the 
more  I  seem  to  miss  him.  He  was 
so  watchful,  so  keen  to  see  any  falling 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
off  in  one's  rendering  of.  a  part,  so 
quick  to  modify  any  little  mannerism 
or  foolish  trick  in  a  beginner's  work  ; 
to  me  there  doesn't  seem  anyone  left 
to  say  "  Dont  !  " 

I  was  fond  of  the  "  Governor  "  ; 
when  I  knew  him  first  he  was  so 
brilliant,  so  versatile,  so  undaunted 
by  failure.  I  watched  him  go  through 
so  much,  saw  him  put  heart  and  soul 
into  everything  he  did,  and  often  lose 
everything  but  his  splendid  courage. 
I  saw  him  make  mistakes  and  retrieve 
them,  build  up  fortunes  and  spend, 
them,  and  in  those  early  days  he  nevei 
lost  his  wonderful  resourcefulness. 
He  changed  afterward  in  many  ways,, 
and  I  dare  say  I  changed  too.  Per- 
haps I  am  too  jealous  for  the  old 
company, but  I  cannot  helpfeelingthat 
224 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

all  the  comic-opera  business  of  later 
years,  with  its  crowd  of  pretty  faces 
and  young  actresses  "  to  be  placed," 
was  a  step-down  for  Mr.  Daly.  Once, 
I  remember,  just  at  the  last,  there 
was  a  general  "  call "  for  the  entire 
company.  We  none  of  us  knew  what 
it  was  for,  but  I  never  questioned  a 
"  call,  "  and  down  I  went.  The  stage 
was  full  ;  there  were  a  few  of  our 
company  there,  but  most  of  them 
were  young  people — chorus  girls  and 
the  like.  The  "  Governor  "  was  busy 
sorting  them  and  arranging  things 
generally  when  he  spied  me,  and  cross- 
ed over  to  me. 

"  What  are  you  doing  here  ?  "  he 
asked.     "  There  was  a  call   for  the 
entire  company,  and  I  suppose  I  still 
belong  to  it,"  I  answered. 
225 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

"  But  I  don't  want  you,"  he  said. 
"I  am  only  dividing  these  people  up 
into  the  different  companies  for  the 
light-opera  stuff."  Then  he  looked 
all  over  the  stage,  and  down  at  me 
with  a  little  frown  :  "  You  don't  like 
all  this,  Grandma  ?  " 

"No,  I  don't.  Not  on  my  own 
account  at  all,  but  this  isn't  like  you, 
a  bit."  And  it  wasn't. 

For  in  its  later  days  the  company 
was  so  modified,  and  his  own  interests 
were  so  widespread,  that  the  whole 
business  did  not  seem  so  typically 
"  Daly's  "  as  in  its  earlier  days.  Only 
Miss  Rehan  and  I  remained  of  the 
"  Big  Four."  Success  had  taken  John 
Drew  from  us,  and  dear  "  Jimmie  " 
Lewis,  with  all  his  lovable  ailingsand 
failings,  had  died. 

226 


"James  Lewis 

From  a  photograph  by  Sarony,  Nctu  "fork.      In  the  collection  of  Mrs.  Gilbert     227 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

Then  came  Mr.  Daly's  death,  in 
the  summer  of  '99,  a  dreadful  shock 
to  us  all,  bringing  with  it,  as  it  did, 
the  breaking  of  all  the  old  ties.  He 
was  a  man  of  such  vitality  that  death 
had  seemed  always  a  remote  possibility 
only,  and,  in  his  many  ventures,  that 
was  the  only  factor  he  left  entirely 
out  of  the  reckoning.  So  his  affairs 
were  left  in  a  good  deal  of  a  tangle, 
and,  for  a  time,  we  none  of  us  knew 
what  was  going  to  happen.  Then, 
for  a  time,  too,  we  thought  that  the 
theatre  was  to  be  retained  by  the  heirs 
and  run  on  the  old  lines ;  and  so, 
many  members  of  the  old  company 
looked  upon  themselves  as  bound  by 
their  original  contracts.  But  when 
the  various  interests  were  carefully 
reviewed,  the  risks  involved  proved 
229 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

to  be  too  great,  and  it  was  decided  to 
sell  the  theatre,  and  to  settle  as  many 
of  the  out-lying  ventures  as  possible, 
Miss  Rehan  retaining  certain  of  the 
plays,  and  arranging  for  her  own  star- 
ring tour  as  soon  as  her  health  should 
permit. 

By  this  time  the  summer  was  well 
forward  and  we  were  all  scattered.  I 
was  staying  with  some  friends  in 
Siasconset,  a  little  out-of-the-way 
town  on  the  Island  of  Nantucket. 
It  was  there  that  the  news  came  to 
me  of  the  sale  of  Daly's  Theatre,  and 
a  real  shock  it  was  !  I  suppose  that 
that  was  taken  by  other  managers  to 
mean  that  Mr.  Daly's  old  company 
was  disbanded,  for  soon  afterward  I 
received  a  letter  from  Mr.  Charles 
Frohman,  about  a  part  he  thought 
230 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

would  suit  me  in  a  new  play  he  was 
putting  on  in  the  autumn.  A  cer- 
tain sense  of  loyalty  to  Miss  Rehan 
and  to  the  old  company — such  as  was 
left  of  it — held  me  back  for  a  time  ; 
but,  as  the  days  dragged  on  in  that 
quiet  island  town,  I  began  to  get 
anxious  about  my  own  affairs,  and 
finally  wrote  to  Miss  Rehan's  busi- 
ness manager,  asking  him  if  I  were  to 
consider  myself  free  to  make  engage- 
ments on  my  own  account.  Back 
came  a  telegram  asking  me  not  to  do 
anything  until  I  had  received  the  let- 
ter that  was  to  follow  by  the  next 
post.  I  waited  one  mail,  two  or  three 
mails,  and  nothing  came.  Then  I 
wrote  to  Mr.  Frohman.'  Several  let- 
ters were  exchanged,  but  letters  are 
unsatisfactory .  things  at  best,  and  I 
231 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

arranged  for  a  personal  interview  at 
eleven  o'clock  of  a  certain  morning. 
For  me  it  meant  quite  a  little  journey 
first,  from  Siasconset  to  Nantucket 
town,  by  the  Central  Railroad  of 
Nantucket — about  a  yard  long  it  is, 
for  all  its  big  name — then  by  boat  to 
New  Bedford  and  rail  to  Fall  River, 
and  finally  by  the  Sound  boat  to  New 
York. 

The  interview  on  the  morning  of 
my  arrival  settled  all  outstanding 
questions  between  Mr.  Frohman  and 
me  in  most  pleasant  fashion,  and  after 
a  few  hours  of  shopping  I  began  my 
return  journey  by  the  same  route  at 
five  o'clock  of  that  afternoon,  with 
my  immediate  future  comfortably  as- 
sured. The  newspapers  got  hold  of 
my  flying  business  trip*,  and  made  a 
232 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

very  pretty  story  out  of  it.  The 
newspapers  have  always  been  good  to 
me,  their  praise  has  been  pleasant 
reading,  and  their  little  warnings 
have  often  helped  me.  Still  my  feel- 
ing has  always  been  that  an  actor 
ought  to  come  somewhere  near  his 
own  ideal,  satisfy  his  manager,  and 
please  his  audience,  before  he  gets 
eager  to  read  what  is  printed  about 
him. 

In  the  early  days  I  had  no  time  to 
study  newspaper  criticisms,  and  my 
husband  seldom  told  me  about  tnem 
Perhaps  he  thought  I  might  get 
spoiled,  but  it  is  more  probable  that 
he  feared  that  I  would  become  dis- 
couraged. He  used  to  say:  "Just 
go  ahead  and  do  your  work  as  well 
as  you  can  and  don't  worry  about  the 
233 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
critics."  I  remember  as  distinctly  as 
if  it  were  yesterday  the  first  time  my 
attention  was  drawn  to  a  newspaper 
notice  of  my  work.  We  were  play- 
ing in  the  West  under  Lewis  Baker's 
management ;  the  play  was  "  Romeo 
and  Juliet,"  the  Juliet  Avonia  Jones, 
the  Romeo  her  mother,  I  think,  al- 
though of  that  I  will  not  be  positive. 
I  was  the  nurse,  my  first  attempt  at 
the  part,  indeed,  my  first  attempt  at 
any  such  important  part,  and  I  was 
as  nervous  as  a  witch.  I  know  that 
during  the  performance  I  was  in  the 
box  that  used  to  be  built  inside  the 
proscenium  arch  so  that  the  actors 
themselves  could  watch  the  stage  dur- 
ing their  waits,  and  get  almost  the 
same  point  of  view  as  the  audience. 
Mrs.  Jones  was  there,  too,  and  she 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

gave  me  many  a  good  bit  of  advice, 
among  others  that  I  should  always, 
every  night  on  returning  from  the 
theatre,  carefully  go  over  the  role  I 
had  just  done,  before  beginning  any 
new  work.  Our  lives  were  too  busy 
to  keep  always  to  that  rule,  but  the 
advice  was  good  in  itself  The  morn- 
ing after  this  performance,  Louis 
Mestayer,  who  had  been  the  Mer- 
cutiO)  was  very  happy  over  the  capital 
notice  the  local  paper  had  given  him. 
That  evening,  I  said  to  my  husband: 
"  Mestayer  is  very  proud  of  the  criti- 
cism of  his  work  last  night." 

"  It's  not  a  bit  better  than  the  one 
you  got,"  answered  Mr.  Gilbert,  as 
quick  as  a  flash.  And  he  was  the 
man  who  pretended  to  disregard  the 
newspapers  !  Of  late  days  my  Eng- 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

lish  nephew  has  carefully  gathered  all 
the  printed  stuff  he  could  find  about 
me,  and  has  carefully  pasted  it  in  a 
book.  And  now  I  go  on  collecting, 
more  to  please  him  than  for  anything 
else.  By  the  way,  there  is  one  bit  of 
criticism  in  my  nephew's  collection 
that  is  amusing,  and  worth  quoting 
in  the  light  of  subsequent  events.  It 
is  from  the  Cleveland  Daily  Review, 
and  the  date  is  June  29,  1857. 

"  Her  peculiar  forte,  we  think,  is 
genteel  comedy,  though  it  is  difficult 
to  decide  this  question  positively 
where  she  appears  in  such  a  variety 
of  parts." 

The  only  time  1  resented  news- 
paper chatter  was  when  I  had  my 
spectacles  stolen.  They  were  snatched 
from  my  belt,  the  case  I  wore  there 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

being  torn  away.  I  spoke  of  it  to 
Mr.  Dorney,  and  the  story  went 
round  the  theatre.  Somehow  the  re- 
porters got  hold  of  it,  and  they  made 
a  great  to-do  about  it.  It  was  really 
too  bad  of  them  !  I  felt  it  the  more, 
because  I  had  managed  to  keep  a 
much  more  serious  theft  an  absolute 
secret.  That  was  at  the  time  when 
so  much  fun  was  being  made  of  the 
"  robbery-of-jewels  "  form  of  theatri- 
cal advertisement.  I  had  a  very 
valuable  pair  of  ear-rings  taken  from 
my  pocket  most  cleverly.  And  I 
was  on  my  way  to  play  for  a  charity, 
too  !  However,  1  kept  my  loss  quite 
to  myself.  And  then  to  be  brought 
before  a  sympathetic  public  as  the 
loser  of  a  pair  of  spectacles  ! 

Stories  and  incidents  come  into  my 
237 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
mind,  now  that  I  am  in  the  way  of 
thinking  back,  that  I  had  forgotten 
for  years.  These  things  are  little  and 
unimportant  enough  in  themselves, 
but  when  I  sit  thinking,  as  I  do 
sometimes,  they  bring  back  my  whole 
life.  Did  I  ever  tell  you  how  I  took 
in  the  "  Governor "  without  know- 
ing it  ?  It  was  in  the  first  Fifth 
Avenue  Theatre  days,  and  we  were 
doing  "  Major  Wellington  de  Boots." 
I  had  had  a  terribly  sore  toe,  a  mat- 
ter of  poultices  and  I  don't  know 
what  all,  but  had  managed  to  keep 
my  misery  pretty  much  to  myself.  I 
wore  black  satin  gaiters,  I  know,  and 
1  cut  a  slit  in  the  top  of  the  foot 
part,  putting  something  black  under 
it.  But  of  course  I  limped  badly 
all  through  the  piece.  Years  after- 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

ward  Mr.  Daly  revived  this  farce. 
When  we  were  rehearsing,  he  began 
to  fidget  and  worry. 

"  You've  forgotten  something  of 
your  part,"  he  told  me. 

"Why,  no,"  I  said,  "I  think  I 
have  all  the  old  business." 

"  When  you  did  it  before,  you  had 
a  perfect  limp." 

"Limp?  Limp?"  Then  I  re- 
membered :  "  That  wasn't  a  limp," 
I  laughed,  "that  was  just  a  sore 
foot." 

"  Never  mind  what  it  was,  I  want 
that  limp  !  "  And  of  course  he  got 
it. 

Then,  I  remember,  I  broke  "  Jim- 

mie  "  Lewis  all  up  one  night  in  "  7- 

20-8."      He    never    liked     his    own 

photographs,  and  there  were  one  or 

239 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

two  that  he  fairly  hated,  and  we  loved 
to  tease  him  about  them. 

This  night,  in  the  last  act,  I  was 
sitting  at  a  desk  with  my  back  to  the 
audience,  writing  something,  and  he 
was  sitting  facing  me,  and  so  of  course 
facing  the  audience,  too.  He  was  all 
curled  up  and  very  meek  and  miserable, 
for  I  had  caught  him  in  his  escapade. 
When  I  was  supposed  to  be  reading 
what  I  had  written,  I  was  really  hold- 
ing the  photograph  he  hated  most  up 
under  his  nose  !  He  curled  up  more 
miserably  than  ever  to  hide  his 
twitching  face. 

Here  is  another  scene  that  is  still 
as  fresh  as  ever  before  my  eyes.  Long 
ago,  when  we  were  coming  home 
from  the  Pacific  Coast,  the  company 
had  its  special  car  at  the  end  of  the 
240 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

train.  Mr.  Daly  always  insisted  upon 
this ;  you  see  no  one  could  make 
any  excuse  for  going  through  our  car 
then,  and  we  had  the  rear  platform 
as  a  sort  of  balcony.  I  had  my  own 
compartment,  and  had  been  sitting 
close  to  the  window,  watching  the 
strange,  barren  country  we  were  pass- 
ing through.  In  a  sort  of  cutting  we 
slowed  down,  and  finally  stopped  for 
a  little.  There  were  no  trees,  no  grass 
even,  and  everything  was  stony  and 
gritty.  Nearly  alongside  of  me  was 
an  incline,  of  perhaps  some  eight  or 
ten  feet,  and  at  the  top  a  cabin,  not 
more  than  one  room,  I  should  think, 
but  very  bright  and  clean.  The 
owner  was  sitting  at  his  door  in  the 
miner's  dress-up  afternoon  costume, 
a  white  shirt — really  white — and  blue 
241 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 

overalls.  Beside  him  was  a  granite 
slab,  almost  like  a  table,  and  on  it,  in 
an  old  battered  tin  can,  the  most  su- 
perb bunch  of  wild  flowers  I  ever  saw, 
they  were  so  brilliant  and  so  well  ar- 
ranged. Near  by  was  a  dog  asleep 
with  his  nose  between  his  paws,  so 
absolutely  still  that  to  this  day  I 
don't  know  whether  he  was  alive  or 
not.  It  made  a  picture  of  bright 
homelikeness  that  was  good  to  see  in 
the  midst  of  those  dreary  plains.  The 
ladies  on  the  train  began  teasing  for 
the  flowers,  beckoning  and  laughing, 
but  the  man  shook  his  head.  At  last, 
just  as  the  train  was  starting  again, 
he  spied  me  at  my  window.  I  smiled 
and  nodded,  and  he  smiled  and  nod- 
ded. Then  I  pointed  to  the  house, 
to  the  dog  and  the  flowers,  and 
242 


Mrs.  Gilbert 


From  a  photograph  by  Houseworth,  San  Francisco.     In  the  collection  of  Evert 
Jansen  Wendell,  Esq. 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

smiled  and  nodded  again,  trying  to 
express  my  pleasure  in  the  whole  pic- 
ture. To  my  surprise,  he  grabbed  up 
the  flowers  and  plunged  down  to  the 
train,  just  managing  to  reach  the  back 
platform.  "Give  them  to  the  old 
lady,"  I  heard  him  say,  and  he  handed 
them  to  Mr.  Dorney.  I  got  to  the 
back  platform  and  waved  my  thanks 
before  we  were  out  of  sight.  The 
flowers  were  lovely,  many  of  them 
highly  colored  relatives  of  our  East- 
ern flowers,  some  of  them  absolute 
strangers  to  me.  I  kept  them  as  long 
as  I  could,  and  used  up  all  the  books 
I  had  with  me  in  pressing  them.  The 
younger  members  of  the  company 
used  to  tease  me  for  outdoing  them 
about  the  "man  with  the  flowers,"  as 
they  called  him.  I  suppose  my  old 
245 


The  Stage  Reminiscences  of 
face  at  the  window  had  stood  to  him 
for  everything  he  had  left  in  the  East; 
for  his  mother's  face  at  her  window, 
for  home,  and  all  the  old  friends  he 
ever  had.  I  have  never  seen  him 
since,  of  course,  but  I  believe  I  should 
know  him  to-day. 

Coming  to  greet  my  old  New  York 
public,  under  a  different  manage- 
ment, and  with  other  than  my  old 
associates,  has  been  like  a  new  birth 
to  me,  and  the  reception  that  met  me 
on  my  entrance  in  "Miss  Hobbs  " 
was  a  complete  surprise.  It  was  not 
the  applause  alone  that  prevented  me 
beginning  my  lines  that  night ;  I  had 
a  good  big  lump  in  my  throat.  Then 
came  my  birthday.  Not  the  eightieth, 
please,  as  they  said  ;  it  was  not  quite 
246 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

long  enough  since  1821  for  that. 
And  besides,  Mr.  Daly  gave  me  my 
seventieth  birthday  party  at  the  Savoy 
Hotel,  in  London,  in  1891.  But  I 
had  thought  that,  with  the  leaving  of 
the  old  life,  I  was  leaving  all  those 
who  remembered  the  old  anniver- 
saries. To  be  sure,  Mr.  Richman,  who 
had  been  a  member  of  our  company, 
knew  the  date,  but  I  never  suspected 
him  of  "telling  on  me."  Even  when 
Miss  Russell  asked  me  to  come  to 
her  after  the  performance  that  even- 
ing, I  was  simple  enough  to  think  it 
was  to  be  only  a  little  supper  at  her 
home.  Instead  came  public  speeches 
at  the  theatre,  and  the  public  presen- 
tation of  the  silver  that,  to  me,  stands 
for  the  personal  affection  of  many 
dear  friends,  old  and  new.  I  have 
247 


Mrs.  Gilbert 

been  trained  to  self-control  all  my 
life,  else  I  really  believe  that  the  sur- 
prise and  the  warm-hearted  kindness 
of  it  all  would  have  upset  me  quite! 
That  kindness  seems  to  be  about  me 
all  the  time  now.  Miss  Russell  has 
made  the  Lyceum  Theatre  like  home 
to  me,  and  I  am  very  happy. 

One  good  friend  of  mine  says  that 
if  she  had  such  beautiful  silver  she 
should  give  up  acting,  and  simply 
stay  at  home  and  have  tea  all  the 
time.  It  sounds  attractive,  but  if  I 
did  that,  I  should  have  serious  doubts 
as  to  the  supply  of  tea,  to  say  nothing 
of  the  other  necessaries  of  life. 


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